EDITOR'S STATEMENT
by Ana Chen, Editor-in-Chief
by Ana Chen, Editor-in-Chief
It feels weird to write about hunger after Thanksgiving dinner, but it also feels weird to be writing this Editor's Statement at home, retracing so much of the past.
"Hunger" bears a lot of weight. Hunger - my eating disorder - characterized so much of my adolescence. A hunger for validation still riddles my artwork. Hunger breathes through me at every turn: hunger for human connection, for acknowledgement. Hunger for a new pair of Levi's, hunger for the familiarity of my home. Hunger for a home, any home.
Last night, I realized that life is just one long process of becoming weaker. Being at college, and distancing myself from all the patterns that had characterized home, meant confronting myself. It meant realizing that ballet had given me depression, anxiety, and severe trust issues alongside an eating disorder. It meant realizing that my family had hurt me more than I had believed possible. It meant realizing my own self-destructive, arrogant, and possessive qualities. It meant realizing the fragility of the illusions I'd created about myself: the directions I'm taking, the choices I've made.
And realizing this has made me weaker. I can no longer hurl myself through a ballet class with the same intensity as my fifteen-year-old self. I don't have the same emotional endurance as the girl who had withstood the last three years of high school.
But at the same time, I'm finally happy. I have awareness and control. The hunger that drives me now - the hunger to push my artistic limits, the hunger to challenge the way I think, to learn from those around me - is so vibrant. In the end, and perhaps I'm being too idealistic (which is a habit I'm really trying to break), it is this kind of hunger that brings us together. My own artistry has made tremendous leaps from the writers and dancers around me. My desire to emphasize with my family has taught me to understand and communicate with them. My hunger to explore everything college has to offer - a privilege I could never quite afford in high school - has made me a much better person.
As 2019 draws to an end, I find myself turning to previous sources of artistic inspiration. "Hunger," by Florence + the Machine, had generated so many of my pieces about my eating disorder. Yet her lyrics aren't entirely pessimistic: what makes "Hunger" one of my favorite songs is precisely its contrast of the dark and hopeful.
Take the last lyrics, for instance:
"...and for a moment / I forget to worry."
- Ana Chen, Founder and Editor-in-Chief
"Hunger" bears a lot of weight. Hunger - my eating disorder - characterized so much of my adolescence. A hunger for validation still riddles my artwork. Hunger breathes through me at every turn: hunger for human connection, for acknowledgement. Hunger for a new pair of Levi's, hunger for the familiarity of my home. Hunger for a home, any home.
Last night, I realized that life is just one long process of becoming weaker. Being at college, and distancing myself from all the patterns that had characterized home, meant confronting myself. It meant realizing that ballet had given me depression, anxiety, and severe trust issues alongside an eating disorder. It meant realizing that my family had hurt me more than I had believed possible. It meant realizing my own self-destructive, arrogant, and possessive qualities. It meant realizing the fragility of the illusions I'd created about myself: the directions I'm taking, the choices I've made.
And realizing this has made me weaker. I can no longer hurl myself through a ballet class with the same intensity as my fifteen-year-old self. I don't have the same emotional endurance as the girl who had withstood the last three years of high school.
But at the same time, I'm finally happy. I have awareness and control. The hunger that drives me now - the hunger to push my artistic limits, the hunger to challenge the way I think, to learn from those around me - is so vibrant. In the end, and perhaps I'm being too idealistic (which is a habit I'm really trying to break), it is this kind of hunger that brings us together. My own artistry has made tremendous leaps from the writers and dancers around me. My desire to emphasize with my family has taught me to understand and communicate with them. My hunger to explore everything college has to offer - a privilege I could never quite afford in high school - has made me a much better person.
As 2019 draws to an end, I find myself turning to previous sources of artistic inspiration. "Hunger," by Florence + the Machine, had generated so many of my pieces about my eating disorder. Yet her lyrics aren't entirely pessimistic: what makes "Hunger" one of my favorite songs is precisely its contrast of the dark and hopeful.
Take the last lyrics, for instance:
"...and for a moment / I forget to worry."
- Ana Chen, Founder and Editor-in-Chief