Dedication of this Blog

I would also like to take a moment to dedicate this post to all the future, and past, recipients of the CCAD Maine Photographic Workshop Scholarship, and to the diligent, caring, and talented professionals at CCAD who give their lives daily to mentor their students.

For the CCAD Media faculty, all of you are such a wonderful inspiration. You may have some idea, but you must know how important you are to us as role models as we have grown up from the wide-eyed freshman that we once were. For me, as a transfer student, you were my secret friends that helped me transition into the asylum they have the nerve to call a College :). You have helped me through the enormous process of growth as an artist, making me feel less hopeless when I was frail and at the edge, and knocking me back down when I was a little too comfortable with my work. You extraordinary people walk the fine line between malice and mothering, and have helped culture the minds of so many. I suppose that is why they call you professionals. :) Either way thank you so much for this amazing opportunity, I would not have been able to do this without you. Although I can never repay any of you for the wealth of knowledge I am about to gain, I hope that you know, in some small fraction, the amount of humble pride, and gratitude I feel for this experience. I hope that you will enjoy this blog as a testimony to your greatness as well. Thank you again.

For the future recipients of the CCAD Maine Photographic Workshop Scholarship, I hope you will make it through your next few months post-receiving okay. People will hate you, if they don't already. They will gossip, maybe even your friends. They will break you down, beat you up, to demonstrate to you that you don't deserve it. Guess what you don't, but you got it didn't you? Know that although you can never deserve that kind of kindness, that impartial decision of the faculty, the wealth of a journey you are about to go on, you do deserve to make the most of it, and you are required to continue the ethics that attributed to your selection in the first place. None of us really deserve what we are given, and we sure as hell take our accomplishments to be only the results of ourselves, but remember we are a collective culture. And, even though, you might strive to break the confines of culture in your work, you still owe your work to your environment, as it is still the source of your reference point. My biggest piece of advice to you is to remember your insignificance and to never forget that what you can be.

Thank you all for your support. I look forward to sharing this experience with you over the next 10 days, and the many years to follow.

Genuinely,
Kelsey lakia