Meet Jerilyn Guerrero

Today we’d like to introduce you to Jerilyn Guerrero.

Thanks for sharing your story with us Jerilyn. So, let’s start at the beginning and we can move on from there.
For as long as I can remember, I’ve always loved to create and draw. One of my earliest memories of recognizing what a drawing is was when one of my great aunts showed me a doodle she did of me. I remember her pointing to the paper of a very simple line drawing of a little girl and saying in that tone you do when you talk to a toddler, “That’s you!” My little kid brain immediately exploded. I was enchanted by what she just did. Without knowing it at the time, I felt it in my little body: “I gotta do whatever THAT is.”

Born on the island of Guam, growing up I played outside a lot in the hot sun and was curious about all kinds of creatures. I was a very energetic and creative child with an active imagination. I drew a lot of anything I saw that lit me up and enjoyed making things with my hands.

With life’s twists and turns my family moved to New Jersey when I was 10, and then I moved to the Bay Area, then back to Jersey, and then back to California again. That whole part can be its own separate story.

As I grew up, I continued drawing but also had a curiosity and craving to learn different skills in which to express myself and make things. If I got my hands on a camera, I was taking pictures; if I had paper/magazines/glue, I was cutting it up to make collages. As soon as I was able to hop on a computer, I played around with making simple websites, learning how to edit videos, and teaching myself how to use Photoshop. I was also writing and making graphic designs in online forums. I always found it fun and satisfying to play around with different mediums and creating something that didn’t exist before.

Even though I did well academically in high school, I got hit with an existential crisis when I graduated. I do not say this lightly. By this time, I had not been thinking about pursuing art and had never seen it shown to me as a real path I could take. I only believed that you go to school, graduate, go to college and study something “useful”. My parents never pressured me to go down any certain career path, but I didn’t know what I should be doing or for what reason. I had left Vallejo, California and I went for my first year of university back in Jersey but had to drop out when I didn’t have money nor the energy to continue my education and the year following was a very dark time for me. The more I began questioning my place and purpose in this world, the more it hurt when I couldn’t come up with any answers and it sent me into depression. One day, my uncle and aunt offered to let me stay with them in California and I somehow found the strength to lift myself out of the fog I was in and go there to attend community college.

While I was at Chabot College in Hayward, I was also volunteering at a non-profit organization called 4C The Power. The goal of the 4C The Power program was to build communities by providing workshops with professional artists for youth in the area of the arts to promote a greater connection to education, their school and community.

The workshops helped students to build their confidence as they learned about their potential through creativity, culture, and responsibility to the community. The director of the non-profit, Diann Kitamura, who we all lovingly call “Mama D”, recognized my potential and really helped me to build my confidence by letting me explore my skills. As a volunteer and intern, I became the in-house graphic designer for all the marketing needs, took photos at events, directed some of the interviews for the promotional videos and even managed the website. At the workshops themselves, I was really inspired by the students who we worked with who really lit up during the showcases. There we were telling them that they can pursue their dreams in art and yet I was not doing that for myself. Seeing them being so brave during the final showcases inspired me to want to pursue my own dreams.

Taking out what would be one of many student loans, I decided to go to Academy of Art University in San Francisco where I studied Web Design & New Media. There, I sharpened my skills as a designer, also learning to code websites, do user experience, photography, and create motion graphics and video. In my first year, I even made my goal of having a piece shown in the Spring Show, with a few more after that. Although I am grateful for my education, learning to be creative on demand soon started to drain me and the looming cloud of student debt building up over me was an added stress. From the beginning, I knew that once I committed to this path, there was no turning back as I desperately needed to graduate, get a good job, and be able to pay off my debt. Self-doubt found its way creeping into me questioning my abilities as a designer and if I would even be able to keep going to this school. But I did what I could to keep going, even if I had to attend part-time sometimes for financial reasons. To keep from feeling overwhelmed about the future, I reminded myself that all I had to do was take baby steps and do what was right in front of me. Things started picking up when I got my first design internship on a marketing team and after what seemed like forever, I finally graduated in 2015. By my senior year, I had locked in a job before I graduated and was working full-time during my last year.

I worked at SurveyMonkey in San Mateo as a Marketing Designer for almost five years. There, I became a Senior Visual Designer where I used my skills to help launch strategic marketing campaigns, creating engaging and thoughtful creative solutions while upholding the integrity of the brand. Although I’ve always been deeply introspective, at the very tail end of 2017 something happened that caused me to really check in with myself and reflect deeply on my life. In my last two years, I started drawing more regularly as a creative outlet outside of my job. I challenged myself to let go of perfectionism and to really experiment and play like I used to when I was a kid. You see, my creative journey is very much tied to my healing/wellness journey and at all times, I want to be taking care of myself. If I have a limited time in this world, I want to be spending my energy in ways that bring me the most joy, peace, and alignment. With tomorrow not being promised, it was and is important for me to move with intention and purpose. It took a long time, but I remembered that drawing was what originally brought me those feelings in the purest form.

Really diving deeper into exploring my interest in art, I started exposing myself to more creative communities and making connections in those spaces. As I saw more creatives who were making a living off of their art or their own passions, I began to see that was possible for myself. I got invited to be a vendor at a small show from someone seeing my work on Instagram and as I started to make more printed items to sell, I applied to some other art shows as well. I was a part of a group show for APAture’s DECLARE Visual Arts 2019 showcase and even tabled at Girl Gang Craft in Oakland. I had never thought about selling my art previously, but I was encouraged by others to try sharing my work in those realms. As it turns out, I really love the whole process–making my own art, sharing it with others and seeing how it resonates with them in ways I couldn’t expect.

In January, I left my job and moved to LA for the adventure and to see how far I can take my passion full-time, with my full energy. It was bittersweet as I was leaving an amazing team, friends, and family but it felt like it was time. I know this is not an easy path, but the more I take action in this direction, the more clarity I receive that this is the one to go on.

We’re always bombarded by how great it is to pursue your passion, etc – but we’ve spoken with enough people to know that it’s not always easy. Overall, would you say things have been easy for you?
Not at all. Like many others, life had its way of distracting me and trying to knock me down. Whether it was a difficult transition when I moved to the States, my identity, to being bullied in my early teens, to depression and financial burden–these are all things that I had to struggle with externally and internally as many others do. Life. “We all do the best that we can with the knowledge that we have at the time.” I heard that quote and it helps me remember to give myself a lot of grace for my past.

But I would say that one of the biggest struggles was overcoming all the limiting beliefs that I had collected along the way that kept me from experiencing my full potential. One of the earliest beliefs that I picked up as a child was that art wasn’t something you could really do unless you wanted to be a “starving artist” among all the other self-doubting beliefs many artists experience. That’s why for a long time, I was very lost as to what I wanted to do with my life even though others always saw me as a creative person. I couldn’t see it myself or I played it down. I let all of those limiting beliefs go. When those kinds of thoughts come up, I identify them and where they come from. Those aren’t me and those aren’t my stories. I am responsible for my own life and what my story is. Many people figured out how to make a living off of their art and passions. I’m not the first one to want to go down this path, and I won’t be the last. I have to remind myself that even back then when I chose to pursue design, it was possible even when I thought the odds seemed against me.

Another struggle I have to mention was that I felt like I had a huge creative block for many years. Sometimes I wanted to draw but didn’t know what. I felt like inspiration or my muse had to drop down on me from the skies. But I eventually found that with refreshed eyes and a playful spirit, I can find inspiration in all things and people around me. So now, when I draw, I don’t judge from where I pull inspiration from. My inner child would be so proud of me.

We’d love to hear more about your work and what you are currently focused on. What else should we know?
I am a Multimedia Artist who specializes in graphic design, illustration, and art direction. These visual narratives remind myself and others that we don’t need to look very far for inspiration and people to learn from–they can be found right in front of us and within. Much of my work at the moment features a lot of womxn, especially womxn of color. Of course, this comes from being one myself and feeling the importance of representation, but it’s really not difficult at all for me to want to highlight womxn of color since I see so many of us just out here being amazing and inspiring others daily. These are womxn I see in the real world. I hope to help womxn empower themselves and see themselves at least once in my art, the same way that I seek to empower and see myself fully through my art.

I’m really proud of a passion project that I’ve recently launched called womxn2womxn. It’s an on-going portrait series of womxn I’ve met along the way who have inspired me in one way or another through just being themselves. Another reminder that we can be inspired by the big and little things through those around us. I ask them how they think they empower themselves and others. There is no exact answer that I’m looking for. I hope that by these wonderful people sharing what they do, it might inspire others to think about the ways that they can empower themselves. My intention is always to uplift others.

So, what’s next? Any big plans?
I have an appetite for translating my work to larger canvases such as murals and interactive spaces. I just finished a mural recently with my friends Rovana Lee and Christine Pasetes and it was so much fun. So if you have a wall, let’s make it happen!

Contact Info:

• Website: jerilynguerrero.com
• Email: [email protected]
• Instagram: instagram.com/jerilynguerrero
• Other: womxn2womxn.com

Image Credit:
Jennifer Cortez, Kwantae Kim

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