Was there a teacher or class that was essential for you?
David Soman's watercolor class was essential for me, not just for learning watercolor but for painting and approaching color in any medium. His watercolor class taught me to be brave and confident in my work, something crucial for watercolor, as the medium tends to dry quickly and be difficult to reverse. Gregory Crane's painting class was also essential for learning color theory purely through practice as I don't use oil paints anymore but have learned so much about color that I can apply it to my work in any other medium. Bruce Waldman, Julia Rothman, Aya Kakeda and Sam Weber were also great instructors who worked in different fields and were so inspiring.

What was your favorite piece of advice a teacher or student shared with you?
David Soman once told me that when you hit a tough challenge and try to work through it, "It's not the pain of 'can't,' it's the pain of growing." I think that's really important because many times when we hit a tough point, especially in creating art, we want to give up because we feel like we can't make it work. But in the end, just like athletes, the muscle has to hurt before it can grow.

What advice do you have for next year's students going through your program?
Try as many different things as you can. You're not going to learn much taking classes from the same instructors and working in the same medium every semester. The whole point of school is to learn and experiment in an environment where the stakes aren't as high. Work hard in your classes and actually absorb and listen to all the information the teachers give because sometimes the information isn't explicitly said, it's shown. Don't be afraid to try something new and fail; you're still young, and one failure doesn't mean the end of everything.

This interview has been condensed and edited.

For this year's SVA Alumni Scholarship Awards, a record 68 students were chosen from a pool of over 270 applicants and were granted scholarships worth more than $60,000 for projects as varied as design products, animation, painting and photography. For more information about the Alumni Scholarship Awards and to see a complete list of this year's recipients, click here.

For more information about SVA's BFA Illustration program, click here.

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"Don’t be afraid to try something new and fail, you’re still young and one failure doesn’t mean the end of everything."