This summer, I wrote, directed, and produced my short film “Hard Break” – a dystopian sci-fi drama set in a world where heartbreak has become weaponized.

This past summer, I used Benenson Award funding to attend the Aspen Music Festival and School (AMFS), where I studied violin in the Orchestra/Instrumental Program from June to August 2025.

I was one of six directors to study at the National Theater Institute in their summer Theatermakers intensive.

I took part in Puppet in Prague’s Marionette Carving + Performance workshop, an intense 22-day program that ran from August 8 to August 30 in the Czech Republic.

I received funding towards my honors thesis project, titled Maunakea and TMT: The Meeting Point of Scientific Exploration, Tourism, & U.S. Imperialism, that I am completing as part of my Program II (Environmental Humanities & Multimedia).

I received the Benenson Award to support Survivors Anchoring Art Narrative Garden (SAANG春风吹), a healing justice project for survivors of gender based violence and cyberbullying.

Utilizing the funding I received from my Benenson Award in the Arts, I enrolled in a jewelry design and gemstone analysis class, Jewelry Essentials, at the Gemological Institute of America (GIA) to complete my Applied Jewelry Professional degree.

We, Angelica Moreno and Andrew Cao, created “Stars, Stripes, & Dinero Dreams,” a documentary focusing on the personal stories of a few Latine business owners in Minnesota.

Urban Interfaces and Urban Experiences is an interactive website that uses digital interfaces as an analog for urban landscapes.

I received Benenson Award funding to live in Los Angeles and complete a Film Production Internship at Skye Film Studios, a woman of color-owned and operated independent film and television studio.

This past summer, I used this funding to pay the tuition of Northern Light Music Festival (NLMF) and Vivace Music Festival.

I had the privilege to learn from nightly conversations with photography students, graphic designers, ceramicists, silversmiths and more at the Haystack School of Craft in the mountains of Maine.

Our goal is to create a film that both reopens discussion about this family history once thought lost to time and to also bring the footage into conversation with the present identity of Eubigheim and the global context.

I received funding to extend my visual arts spring capstone project from a reinterpretation of Asian American Theater into a more comprehensive art book project about Chinatown and motifs of “China” in America.

I spent this summer exploring the soundscape of North Carolina. While I was living in Durham and recording music with my friends, I became interested in how noise, low-fidelity recordings, and “imperfections” can be used to create interesting music rather than hindering its quality.

This summer, I was fortunate to participate in two programs that expanded both my musical and language skills: the American European Federation (AEF) and the Vienna International Music Academy (VIMA).

I received $2500 to compose a chapbook of flash fiction pieces exploring and critiquing the psychological archetypes of the Swiss psychoanalyst Carl Jung.

My award has been allocated to further my undergraduate thesis research “In Between Spheres,” which encapsulates themes of identity and functionality through mixed paintings and sculptures. Through historical research and visual construction, this project explores the experience of being in between spheres.

I applied for funding to learn the foundations of print making with the master printmaker Maureen Lucia Booth in her studio outside of Granada, Spain. I returned home with not only foundational knowledge in traditional printmaking from a master printmaker but also with my very own handmade artist book about my grandfather.

I was fortunate to receive funding through the Benenson Awards in the Arts for my documentary project titled "A Funeral For Ice." The project aimed to shed light on the concept of ecological grief by narrating the story of the first glacier in the world to be declared "dead" and have a funeral held for it- the Okjökull Glacier in Iceland.

In partnership with the Alabama Rivers Alliance and Southern Exposure Films, I used the Benenson Award in the Arts to create a documentary with Indigenous advocates about Indigenous land issues in the American Southeast.

Through the 2023 Benenson Award in the Arts, I had the honor of attending Ballet Hispanico’s ChoreoLaB, a 2-week summer program designed for pre-professional dancers to advance their careers and immerse themselves in a professional dance experience.

This summer I had the wonderful opportunity to spend a month at the American Dance Festival (ADF) in Durham.

I received funding to attend the Design Discovery academic program at the Harvard Graduate School of Design. I participated in the three-week program as a member of the Landscape Architecture cohort.

I embarked on a journey to uncover my Tibetan lineage through the power of music. The Award supported me in creating a studio album consisting of eight tracks, each sung in Tibetan and English.

I spent my days working alongside Black writers from across the globe (though mainly from the US). This is the first conference that I have attended, and I could not have been more grateful to have this group of writers by my side through the experience.

I received funding to write an original play, entitled Sugar at Four in the Morning.

Thanks to the Benenson Family, I was able to finally start cutting, gluing, soldering, and assembling the bass of my dreams. I am calling it the “Polar Bass,” since on its side, the body and headstock look like two polar bears smiling at one another.

The Benenson Award helped me and my co-organizers organize a Chinese queer feminist Ciba Punch performance in Irvine, California; shoot a short film with two Chinese (im)migrant workers from Red Canary Song; host a series of collective poetry-writing workshops across the US and China; and sustain my documentary fieldwork on Chinese queer feminist communities

I attended Claremont, California for a full-length piano solo recital at the Good Shepherd Lutheran Church, as well as my tuition at the Borromeo Music Festival in Switzerland.

I attended MusicAlp Academy in Tignes, France with the support of the Benenson Award in the Arts. MusicAlp Academy brings together musicians from around the world for music education and performance.

“Three Stories of Gentrification” is a book that compiles photography and stories to explore the issue of gentrification within local communities, businesses, and urban spaces.

An upcycled fashion collection that speaks to a multi-cultural identity by using traditional Korean and American garments.

Exploring motifs in Saba Taj's "There are Gardens at the Margins" as part of an honors thesis with the Duke International Comparative Studies Department on queer Muslim environmentalisms in the United States.

A bilingual screenplay that tackles the issue of immigration—featuring narratives of refugees from Ukraine and Russia—was composed within a four-week summer intensive workshop at the Pargue Film School.

A 7-week Orchestra program at Brevard Music Center Summer Institute & Festival provides an opportunity to elevate skills as a classical cellist by participating in lessons with BMCO professors, practicing in orchestras, and string quartets.

"The Sharpest Corners,” a story of a daughter who is estranged from her family who returns home after the passing of her father, was further developed with a trip dedicated to visiting the small town the novel takes place in.

A Summer Dance Intensive with American Dance Festival (ADF) blossomed into self-discovery through modern dance and community.

Branching into theater with introductory workshops taught by professional acting coaches in Los Angeles.

Navigating maintenance and engagement art museum operations at the Peggy Guggenheim Collection, Venice, Italy.

A program designated for designers, engineers and sustainability advocates searching for ways to expand model-making techniques and carpentry skills with bamboo.

Acquiring training and practice of the “invisible art.” A 6-week online Manhattan Editing Workshop provides a walkthrough of post-production techniques with courses and resources.

Orsolina 28, a dance program that brings together artists to not only provide opportunities of practice, but also of mindfulness of movement to the surrounding world.

Training at the Ndere Cultural Centre to learn Ugandan dances and instruments as part of the Development of Music, Dance, and Drama (MDD) Program in Kalangala, Uganda.

Pursue an acting curriculum full-time for the first time at the Stella Adler Studio of Acting in New York City.

This dystopian dark comedy, “Pin Drop Silence,” follows the story of a school teacher who quits his job to start a private academy.

Progression through the first level of a self-guided mastery hand knitting program supplemented with short-term correspondence courses.

Sights and sounds of the Southwest is documentary project that explores landscape of Albuquerque, NM. The project seeks to point out the acute observations that make this land and culture so unique.

In a world where comic book characters live side by side with real people, Malachi Washington works to free comics cast in prejudice bodies while Bob McCay seeks to revive his father's comic strip Little Nemo in Slumberland. What follows is a compelling story of reckoning, healing, and examining the racist legacy of comics and animation, told through various forms of puppetry.

The Transfer Station is a documentary photography project that examines what our waste says about who we are as people today. As our society’s waste gets continuously transferred, The Transfer Station addresses the question: where will it all eventually go? What will become of our discarded, once-valuable possessions—and of us?

“Revelations” is an audio memoir/personal narrative about leaving a cult, losing family and living with their memory. It chronicles Arlene’s effort to learn about her estranged parents outside the Jehovah’s Witness framework, without actually talking to them.

A documentary that uncovers a prevailing nostalgia for the countryside, specifically in the American West, as the rural landscape undergoes rapid transformation by urbanization, climate change, and development.

I spent the summer training in jazz and Carnatic voice traditions. As an opera singer, this allowed me to explore the pedagogical practices comparatively while studying completely new music genres.

This summer, I wrote, analyzed, and taught Asian/American women's poetry.

This project is a photographic documentation of the unique practice and life of physicians who treat underserved/under-resourced communities with shortages of health care in North Carolina.

“Usya” is a short film project centering on my great-grandmother’s reflections on home and motherhood as she remembers fleeing her native city in the south of Russia and having children in the wake of the Second World War.

I enrolled in Upright Citizens Brigade's Improv 101 and Lesly Kahn & Co.'s monthly courses to receive professional training in improvisation and screen acting across a variety of genres.

I took a six-week film intensive at NYU Tisch this summer called Sight and Sound Filmmaking with Professor Vondie Curtis Hall. During the course, I made seven short films.

My pre-pandemic plans involved performing orchestral and wind music in the United States and Austria at several summer festivals. Instead, I spent the summer studying orchestral scores and preparing for my first semester as a graduate student in Conducting.

With the support of the Benenson, I took levels one and two of The Second City's Stand-Up Comedy training series.

"false chronology" is an extension of my film by the same name. It is an exploration of the lingering French colonial consciousness in Algeria and the fading traditions of the Algerian Amazigh people, specifically the custom of facial tattoos.

A visual arts series based on my experience during the difference stages of 2020 through different media.

I spent the summer producing art alongside fifteen other artists at HART Haus, a Hong Kong-based shared studio space.

I wrote a full-length play titled God's Last Name, a piece written for one actor and a series of recorded voices. The play tells the story of Huck and Amy, two sisters who find themselves driving a mysterious (and possibly dangerous?) hitchhiker to St. Louis.

Originally, I was hoping to attend the New York State Summer Writers Institute at Skidmore College for a fiction writing workshop. Due to COVID-19, I ended up attending Strikethrough Workshop, a virtual creative writing workshop at the University of Houston, and learned from Gulf Coast Journal fiction editor Obi Umeozor.

High school and college students took ten photographs that described their everyday experiences with asthma and/or allergies. Depicting foods, asthma inhalers, seasonal allergies, and lifestyle adjustments, their images illustrate the multifaceted and diverse impacts of these chronic conditions.

I am writing a novel about a female scientist's fight against sea level rise and climate change.

My project is a screenplay that follows Philip Ahn, the first Korean-American movie star, as he rises to stardom while pandering to Hollywood discrimination. This year, I will continue to refine the project through the Studio Duke program in conjunction with UTA literary partner Julien Thuan.

My original plan for the Benenson Award was to participate in the Clazz music festival in Arcidosso, Italy. Because of the pandemic, I shifted my plans to creating a portfolio of recordings across multiple styles.

"Si Parla, Si Canta" is a young artist development program held in Arona, Italy which focuses on the Italian language and the Italian style of singing. I partook in this program in the summer of 2019 and was invited to return for the 2020 edition.

A portfolio of LGBT-themed short films and feature screenplays-in-development, with the broad goal of raising the LGBT awareness of mainstream audiences.

At the Italian language and music summer program "Si parla, si canta" in Arona, Italy, I was surrounded by others who were not only extremely talented but also very passionate about opera.

I designed and executed a collaborative mural project at PediPlace, a nonprofit pediatric clinic in Lewisville, Texas. The 5’ x 10’ artwork encourages healthy lifestyles as patients add a leaf to the tree with their initials and pounds lost, marking their achievement and motivating others to stay fit.

I spent the summer studying with the New York Film Academy in Paris, France. There, I got the chance to spend five days a week learning on-camera acting technique. After class and on weekends I acted in students' films, all in the place where cinema was born.

As a conducting scholar at the Eastern Music Festival, I was on the podium every day conducting readings, rehearsals, sectionals, and performances of repertoire covering three full orchestral programs per week.

I attended the Kibbutz Contemporary Dance Company Summer Intensive located in Ga'ton, Israel, a 4-week program that was led by professional dancers from the host company and other successful companies.

The Theatermakers Summer Intensive in directing is a highly competitive training program at the National Theater Institute. It exposes four directors every year to innovative and challenging techniques in directing, script analysis, staging and composition as they work with professional directors, actors and playwrights.

I am exploring a changing human relationship to the ocean as resource in the midst of an anthropogenically altered coastal landscape and future. I focus on the oyster, an organism experiencing reconsideration in North Carolina's coastal communities for its potential ecological and economic significance.

Support from the Benenson Award for the Arts enabled me to travel to Venice, Italy and learn about museum work from one of the most highly regarded collections of modern art in the world. I gained invaluable experience in museum education and programming as well as collections management and curation.

My plan for a poetic apprenticeship in Charles Olson's Open Field Poetics changed after I was granted the opportunity to present at a conference, ReVIEWING Black Mountain College 11, in Asheville, NC.

I completed a 15-minute film that uses the relationships between my extended family and the military dictatorship that ruled Brazil from 1964 to 1985 to consider the ways ideology is passed down through the family.

My internship involved both administration—managing class registrations, creating email content, and developing a system to analyze attendance data for grant reporting—and assisting in up to 8 dance classes per week.

I continued my study of Kuchipudi dance under the aegis of legendary dancers Raja, Radha and Kaushalya Reddy in New Delhi, India, expanding my knowledge of the traditional repertoire while also working on new, modern choreographic ventures.

My project highlights the nuances and ingenuity of southern cooking techniques from Italy and America and the role they play in wider conceptions of cuisine.

I attended the New York Summer Writing Institute, a four-week series of workshops and readings at Skidmore College in Saratoga Springs, working with Cristina Garcia to revise and generate short stories to prepare for MFA applications.