The first gallery I ever admired was my grandmother’s. Her sketches and paintings punctuated every single wall in her house. I wish I could’ve asked her about them, but she only spoke Finnish and, at four years old, I’d barely mastered English. Art, however, is not bound by nouns and verbs, and it talked to me every time I was there.

I watched in bewilderment, as I realized it was something she passed down. Both my father and his brother could draw whatever popped into their brains. As an elementary school student, I would run up to them with ballpoint pens and lined notebook paper, begging for commissions: “Can you draw me a rollerskating dog?” “Please draw me a bunny in a basket!” “Can you draw my cat on a school bus with me?”

And they could. My dad had a more abstract, cartoonish style, while my uncle’s hyper realism was remarkable. I thought they were doing magic. And the older I grew, the more I felt that creativity was a birthright for both myself and my sister (who is also wildly talented). Natural talent is more or less a myth; natural curiosity and creativity is where the alchemy’s at, and that has been passed down in my family through generations. It’s part of our lore.

My grandmother couldn’t explain her work to me or talk me through her techniques. In fact, all I have left of her is a couple rough sketches, but her own self-expression helped me understand mine. You hear so much about generational curses that sometimes we forget about generational magic and how special it can be.