Elsie Parmar, Div. 670, signed up for Art Appreciation class for one reason only: to fill the art requirement at Lane. She had no idea she had signed up for something life-changing.

 “I didn’t really know I could draw until then. I haven’t taken any art classes outside of that, but that’s when I learned I could draw and that I like it,” Parmar said. “I started out with drawing and then I stemmed into charcoal portraits. Anything that has to do with charcoal makes me happy.”

 Charcoal drawings, Parmar said, are her true calling.

“Charcoal is more forgiving. I like how I can’t exactly hold paint in my hands when I am painting, but with charcoal, I can get as messy with it as I want. I just like the feeling of it on my hands. I like how even though it’s black and white, you can fit so much depth into it.”

Although she has become proficient in charcoal drawings, Parmar refuses to make profit off her art. She enjoys gifting her art to others.

“People have asked me to draw things for them and then they’ll pay me or I would have to design things for other people and I have a boundary set for what I could do and what I couldn’t do,” Parmar said. “Those boundaries make me lose my interest in what I’m doing. I don’t like it when I have a specific, set line.”

Surprisingly, Parmar does not want to study art after high school. The reason for this is not only that she wants to go into the medical field, but also because she believes that art is not meant to be studied.

“I like drawing more to help me calm down,” Parmar said. “It’s like a stress reliever for me, and that’s how I got better at it. I like being an artist out of my love for art. I’m afraid that if I ever go into art as a career, then I’ll lose interest in it and I don’t want that to happen.”

However, she does aim to include her love for art into her dream to become a doctor. Parmar said that she would love to incorporate her designing techniques into medical materials.

Until then, Parmar puts her energy into henna designs. She enjoys drawing with henna, which is traditional dye usually drawn on hands–on her friends and family.

“I would always buy a cone and ask my grandma or mom to do it on me and I just began to practice on myself until I got better at it,” Parmar said. “I’ve come a long way. Henna and my drawing are polar opposites. Henna is more animated and it’s pretty, little squiggles everywhere. But the way I like drawing is realistic, not decorative. I don’t know how they collided.”

Parmar also uploads her art pieces onto social media and marvels at how some of her friends, who have known her since middle school, are still surprised at her recently-found talent.

“It made people more open to the side of me that draws,” Parmar said. “Honestly, I see so many artists around me that draw better than I do. I never really thought that putting my pieces on social media would make any difference, but it’s crazy the amount of appreciation everything gets.”

One of Parmar’s favorite artists go by the name of “Banksy.” Banksy, who is a British street artist, and political activist, but keeps his identity unknown, has very thought-provoking art pieces. His latest installation, Dismaland, a “bemusement park,” expressed Disneyland in

“Modern art is stemming off of traditional art and is able to be just as powerful. Banksy has really moving pieces and maybe a 100 years from now people will look up to him just as people look up to Van Gogh.”

“I like the way Banksy puts so much into a little picture, because it looks effortless but there’s so much more meaning,” Parmar said. “And the meaning depends on you. That’s what I aim for. I don’t like having just one meaning to my drawings.”

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Elsie Parmar