My name is Cheska Orias, the current editor-in-cheif for The Pinion. This will be 3rd year serving the newspaper as I go onto my final year as a senior.

I specialize in illustrative art, cartoons and graphic design.

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Art has always been a escape for me, allowing me to take a break from the harsh reality of the world and allowing me to express myself freely. I’ve always draw for my personal enjoyment or friends and never could have thought that my art could leave an impact on others. Yet, when I joined The Pinion my freshmen year I was able to see that mark my art left in people.

Joining the schools newswriting class, The Pinion, I found it ironic that someone like me, who was deathly afraid of talking to others, was able to find my place in the staff and grow as a person. Finding out I could use art for my articles made me excited and relived that I didn’t need to ask others for help getting art. I started out with simple chibi characters that never really told a story, yet as the year went on I found myself putting hours of effort into a single art piece. The art piece that helped push me into drawing more with a purpose was for my opinion article  “It Still Hurts” where I talked about my mental health struggles. I found myself fixating on it for hours, pouring all my emotions into it and when it was finally finished I was so proud of myself. After that art piece I started creating art to think more about what kind of details I could add to make my art more meaningful, the composition of my art and what kind of story I wanted to tell.

Since then I’ve not only made art for my articles but also for other members of The Pinion. This not only helped bring me out of my shell, but helped me understand how to communicate with others when they ask for art. The first time I made art for another reporter was during freshmen year. They were actually a friend of mine, struggling on what kind of photo/art to go with their article which talked about how school lessons stayed relevant beyond campus. When they turned to me for help I was hesitant, but went with it. I asked for references, questioned what kind of style they wanted and read their article draft to give me a better understanding on what I needed to create. Constantly I would update them on the progress by sharing sketches, and in the end I was able to create an art piece they enjoyed and had meaning.

I continued to create art pieces that illustrated different things such as suicide awareness, self-harm, derealization, toxic positivity and art for reviews. Art not only became an escape for me, but a way for me to help spread awareness on topic and tell a story.

Self-harm isn’t just cutting your wrists with a blade, but it can be picking at your skin, pulling your hair or starving yourself; self-harm has no one look, appearing different for everyone. With this digital illustration I was able to depict a form of self-harm I struggled with myself. It helped bring insight to what it feels like to self-harm, allowing those who don’t self-harm take a peek into the thoughts of somehow who’ve had.

Healing takes a long time and the scars left from self-harm stays forever, but thats okay. The Japanese art of kintsugi is were one takes a broken thing and repair it with gold; embracing the cracks as part of life. In this art I illustrated my own hands and wrists with the scars in gold. I can hide it all I can, but it will always be apart of me, and that’s okay. I’ve learned to live with the scars and healed from that moment onward.

Derealization can be a distorting or stress inducing experience. Not being able to tell if things are real and merely feeling like a visitor in your own body. It’s not a topic that is talked about a lot, thus not many people know what it is. With this digital illustration I’m able to show others how it feels by using my own experience. Color can look saturated or unsaturated and objects looking misplaced, almost as if a chromatic aberration effect was placed on my vision.

Epic: The Musical is a concept album created by Jorge Rivera-Herrans, the musical being based on Homer’s epic poem,  “The Odyssey,” which follows Odysseus’ journey back home to Ithaca. Each batch is songs being released as different sagas, or plot beats in his journey. When I first listened to the musical it blew my mind away with the amount of thought put into each song, along with the loving community behind it. With this illustration I’m able to depict the nine sagas, some major characters and myself in the middle

Although The Pinion staff talk to others about their stories, besides their staff profile on the website some people don’t know them that well. Every year I draw The Pinion staff as something as in previous years I’ve done school stereotypes and superheros, while this year I’ve drawn them as different book genres. With cover illustration I’m able to depict some of the staffers as there favorite book genres, while also having them sign there name on the bottom. It not only allows people to get to know them more, but for them to express themselves better.