“South Asian inspired art is something I didn’t grow up seeing, but I saw a lot of other cultures and I thought it would be cool to look at mine.”

I have a lot of inspiration, but finding that South Asian niche is really important to me. I look at paintings of the Mughal era, Pakistani truck art, textile patterns — it's all really interesting. South Asian inspired art is something I didn't grow up seeing, but I saw a lot of other cultures and I thought it would be cool to look at mine. There's a lot of interesting history that goes into South Asian art in general. I like seeing that in my work and I hope to bring that more into the general industry. I love telling stories through art and using it as a form of self expression and representation.

I love making stuff that reminds me of something in my own life. I am in the MSA at my university and the girls who see my Instagram loved how I drew a hijabi or made an Eid drawing every Eid. It's hard to find professional Muslim artists in the industry because I feel like a lot of them had to assimilate to the general style.

I'm currently illustrating Islamic children stories for Al-Kisa Foundation, and it's definitely something I want to pursue in the future. There's a lot of imagination and nostalgia that goes into that. It has to do Muslim representation, and making Islamic stories kind of mainstream. Because growing up, I feel like there wasn't much work put into our Islamic stories.

You have to find a balance because you know that you're that you're a South Asian artist, you're a Muslim artist, and you want to represent that. But you also just want to have fun without the pressure. I hope I can inspire more people because growing up, everyone around me was doing computer science and STEM. But nowadays, my younger cousins will say they want to be artists like me. I'd like to see more of that outside my family.