Angelina Omara

Why do you use the medium you use? I feel like I can express myself using the color pencils.

What role does art play in your life? It plays a big role. I can express myself and my feelings through art.

What inspires you to create? What inspires me to do art is to create my life and how I'm feeling. It's personal to me. It is through my life and what has led me to art.

Transformation Statement

Transformation to me means having the mindset to transform your mindset to live a more fulfilling life by striving to have attainable goals. I have transformed by coming to Shakopee and having a 198 year sentence. I was in abusive relationships and I was really broken, I felt defeated, I had a lot of sorrow, I felt shame, I felt guilt. I went through Prison Fellowship Academy and I worked hard in my thinking and applied myself to reach goals to better myself. I had an identity. I feel strong and courageous. I didn't stay stuck in my abuse but I broke free and I transformed into a women that now helps other women that feel the same way I did. It's like a butterfly, we have to go through stages in our life. To create and transform ourselves, to transform and really change ourselves for the better is to renew our mindset. I lived in abuse and bondage and didn’t change. I stayed in it for 20 years. Today, I can say I feel free and even if I have 198 year sentence, I can show others what it looks like to transform themselves. That is what it’s about to me. To transform you have to be willing to change your circumstances around you, to strive to be who you are and to not let anything get in your way of that. Have tangible goals that you can obtain and will last a lifetime, go to groups to give you the information you need to do that. To step out even when it fearful or unknown and then you will see the transformation over time. It takes time to be able to better yourself. There’s a quote from Nicolas Sparks, “Where does a story truly begin? In life, there are seldom clear-cut beginnings, those moments when we can, in looking back, say that everything started. Yet there are moments when fate intersects with our daily lives, setting in motion a sequence of events whose outcome we could never have foreseen.” We can transform. My hope for transformation is for people to be able to transform their lives for themselves and their children.