I am writing this blog post a couple days after attending my last photo shoot day in the photo studio at school. Before transferring to Cal State East Bay almost two years ago, I was lost and had no sense of direction during the six years before that. I was working a part-time retail job, teaching dance part-time, going to community college, and trying to be a dancer in L.A. I knew I couldn’t focus on four different things at once, but I was stubborn and young during those first couple years and thought I could make it work.
Fast-forward to the year before moving to the bay. I’m still trying to do four different things at once and not fully reaching my potential in any of the four things I was trying to do. I had bought a camera in 2011 to take videos of dance rehearsals and document going to competitions. I think I only used that camera for a year or two before letting it collect dust. It wasn’t until the summer of 2016 where I decided to bring the camera out and start using it again. That summer I started taking self-portraits of myself and posted those to instagram. I was hoping to maybe become some sort of fashion blogger to get free clothes from my favorite companies. I wouldn’t start taking portraits till fall of 2016.
During that same summer, I gave myself an ultimatum. If I couldn’t figure out how to transfer out of community college and make a plan to get my degree soon, I would drop everything and join the navy. I met with a counselor and set a plan to become a photo major and transfer out in a year. After switching majors at least five different times (my first major being photography, funny how things work out) I finally had a plan to get out.
Now we fast-forward to the present, I am now 3 weeks away from graduating with a Bachelors in Photography. The show I put on was more or less graduation for me. It represented everything I have gone through in the past eight years to get to this point in time. I had to go through these eight years of being lost to figure out what I truly wanted to do.
Thank you to everyone that came out and saw my show Things I Imagined, and thanks to everyone who couldn’t come out but sent very thoughtful messages. Your support and love help me get through the sleepless nights. It makes it all worth it.
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Patrick Andrada
Filmed by Ryan Abary - @raryabary @marroncreatives
Edited by Niko Rodriguez - @technicalbasis @marroncreatives
Photos by Josh Cachapero - @j_cacha
Edited by Patrick Andrada - @patrickandrada @marroncreatives
