My name is Miranda Pedigo, I am a 31-year-old college student seeking a degree in Graphic Design to fulfill my lifelong dream of receiving a degree in art. That lifelong dream has been challenged for many reasons, perhaps beginning with suffering sexual abuse at the hands of a family member as a child. Although, on its face, this appears to be “a hardship,” it is not those months in and of themselves that have challenged me, it was the proceeding years of mental health struggles that really forced me to become the person that I am today in their battling. Throughout my teenage years, the aftermaths of those events became obstacles, that at a great many moments felt truly insurmountable: I struggled with, although did not have the resources to yet identify, post-traumatic stress disorder which in turn led to severe depression, suicidal ideation, self-harm, a severe eating disorder, and a great host of other struggles. Despite these challenges, I remained a self-motivated and academically inclined student. I graduated high school at the age of 16 with academic excellence and, so determined to earn a college degree, poured every penny that I began earning at the age of 14 into paying the out-of-state tuition to attend the local community college. You see, due to the aforementioned childhood traumas, I had, upon graduation, been forced to move away from my Nashville-based family to live with my older sister outside of Atlanta. The out-of-state tuition and the struggles of that sudden and painful move did not deter me; I knew that achieving an education was the most important achievement for me to better myself and my situation. Throughout college, I remained high-achieving, maintaining a perfect 4.0 GPA for many semesters and receiving honors. However, my mental health struggles were still very much ruling my life. I eventually sought help where I learned of the nature of those struggles. I spent many years in therapy and eventually went into an inpatient program to help in my recovery. I have worked hard for a decade and a half to address these problems and have made marked progress. In these many years of carrying the weight of my childhood traumas and the consequent adult mental health issues, I have found a calling in helping those without a voice. I have primarily focused this passion on helping animals. For over 3 years, I worked at a veterinary office so that I could be a loving source of healing for pets and abandoned pets, as well as to be their voice and advocate. I have additionally spent several years volunteering at shelters to care for dogs and cats that have no one else and to help them find loving homes, where they feel safe. Lately however, in the last year as I’ve returned to college to seek the art degree that I have hoped for since I was a small child, I have found a new way of advocating for those without a voice. I have focused a good deal of my art and my projects on speaking to sexual assault, in women and children alike. I developed a project a year ago, during my first semester back, to provoke thought on the relationship between sexual objectification and sexual assault. This project was selected to be presented in a southeastern regional art exhibition, ArtFields, of professional working artists, where my message reached thousands of viewers. It is with this new strength and power I’ve found a purpose for my studies and my art. I intend to use my degree and my art to work in advocacy for sexual assault victims. I have even found a mentor at my university who used her Graphic Design degree in much the same way, working particularly with non-profit organizations that are working to make a difference for many without a voice. I hope to utilize her mentorship so as to do the same and to continue my work in advocacy for women and children who have been victims of sexual assault.

My name is Miranda Pedigo, I am a 31-year-old college student seeking a degree in Graphic Design to fulfill my lifelong dream of receiving a degree in art. That lifelong dream has been challenged for many reasons, perhaps beginning with suffering sexual abuse at the hands of a family member as a child. Although, on its face, this appears to be “a hardship,” it is not those months in and of themselves that have challenged me, it was the proceeding years of mental health struggles that forced me to become the person that I am today. Throughout my teenage years, the aftermaths of those events became obstacles, that at a great many moments felt truly insurmountable: I struggled with, although did not have the resources to identify, post-traumatic stress disorder which in turn led to severe depression, suicidal ideation, self-harm, a severe eating disorder, and a great host of other struggles. Despite these challenges, I remained a self-motivated and academically inclined student. I graduated high school at the age of 16 with academic excellence and, so determined to earn a college degree, poured every penny that I began earning at the age of 14 into paying the out-of-state tuition to attend the local community college. I had, upon graduation, been forced to move away from my Nashville-based family to live with my older sister outside of Atlanta. The out-of-state tuition and the struggles of that sudden and painful move did not deter me; I was determined to receive a college degree. However, my mental health struggles were still very much ruling my life. I eventually sought help where I learned of the nature of those struggles. I spent many years in therapy and eventually went into an inpatient program to help in my recovery. I have worked hard for a decade and a half to address these problems and have made marked progress. In these many years of carrying the weight of my childhood traumas, I have found a calling in helping those without a voice. I have primarily focused this passion on helping animals. For over 3 years, I worked at a veterinary office so that I could be a loving source of healing for pets and abandoned pets, as well as to be their voice and advocate. I have additionally spent several years volunteering at shelters to care for dogs and cats that have no one else and to help them find loving homes, where they feel safe. In the last year, as I’ve returned to college, I have found a new way of advocating for those without a voice. I have focused a good deal of my art and my projects on speaking to sexual assault, in women and children alike. I developed a project a year ago, during my first semester back, to provoke thought on the relationship between sexual objectification and sexual assault. This project was selected to be presented in a southeastern regional art exhibition, ArtFields, of professional working artists, where my message reached thousands of viewers. I’ve found a purpose for my studies and my art: I intend to use my degree and my art to work in advocacy for sexual assault victims. I have even found a mentor at my university who used her Graphic Design degree in much the same way, working particularly with non-profit organizations that are working to make a difference for many without a voice. I hope to utilize her mentorship to do the same and to continue my work in advocacy for women and children who have been victims of sexual assault.

My favorite work is an installation piece created out of cardboard: the piece was designed to evoke thought about the relationship between sexual objectification of women and the prevalence of sexual assault, alongside the acceptance of rape culture. I presented the viewer with a life-sized camera on a tripod, aimed directly at them, in a dark-room style setting where photographs depicting the implied progression of a sexual assault are hung above. The floor around the the tripod is littered with evidence of the crime: torn women’s underwear, a bottle of rohypnol, a broken wine bottle, and other artifacts that makes the viewer feel as if they’ve stumbled unwittingly onto the scene of the crime. The viewer walks around the space, is able to interact with the objects, experience the camera as the subject or victim, or as the cameraman or perpetrator. This is my favorite work that I’ve created because I have struggled for years to find ways to express my own personal experiences with trauma, as well as to give a voice to other victims, and to allow others insight into the dark realities and the problematic nature of some behaviors we take for granted. Creating this work was emotionally challenging and at times i wondered if it was worth it. However, the response from viewers was overwhelming in the best way: it made people uncomfortable, it was eye opening, it challenged people. My goal with my art is to continue giving voices to victims.

My situation is an incredibly unique one, posing many challenges: I am a 30-year-old student, returning to university after several years spent developing my career. To pursue my passion, I decided to abandon the successful career that I had spent so long laboring over and carefully growing. Since I was a very young child, I knew I wanted to study art. It was my only passion throughout my youth, and it was always part of my plan to attend art school. I fastidiously planned, from the age of 9, how I would one day attend the School of the Museum of Fine Arts at Tufts University. I carried this dream for five years. Of course, things never quite go as planned. I was disallowed to study art as I had planned because of struggles with my home life and family situation. However, the dream of doing so never left my heart. At the age of 30, I gave up my career, opted for much more modest housing arrangements, emptied my savings account, began living off ramen noodles once more, and returned to school because the passion and drive I have for Graphic Design far outweighs for me the security of a well-established career, financial stability, and comfortable living. As a person with mental health struggles and a trauma history, I found that my creative work allows me to give a voice to my struggles, allows others to connect with those struggles in a way that words are not capable of, and helps others with similar backgrounds to feel seen and represented. This has led me to incorporate social advocacy centrally within my current work and my eventual career goals. I have found that using art and design to speak to feminist issues and raise awareness about sexual violence, in particular, has been an incredibly effective way to communicate the depth and breadth of those issues to those who do not necessarily have a former awareness of them. I intend to pursue social advocacy when I graduate so that I can continue using art and design to build awareness about these issues. One of my current professors built her Graphic Design company around working with non-profits to further issues she is passionate about; this has inspired me to follow a similar career path so that I may be able to use my work to help advocate for victims of sexual violence. After graduation, I hope to develop my company, Midheaven, LLC, into a fully operational full-time Graphic Design company. Initially, I want to work and develop myself as a Graphic Designer in as many areas as possible and to gain the guidance and leadership of those who have been working for a great deal of time in the industry. However, my ultimate goal is to use my work and my company to give a voice to women and victims of sexual violence and sexual assault. I have seen the way that my art and design projects which focused on the issues of sexual violence have impacted those who have experienced them, and I know that I can continue, in my career, to work in this way and spread awareness of these issues and impacts. My aim for 10 years down the road is to grow my company in the non-profit area, working primarily on projects that seek to bring positive change surrounding sexual violence, as well as feminist issues.