We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Mascara Beetle a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Hi Mascara, thanks for joining us today. Can you open up about a risk you’ve taken – what it was like taking that risk, why you took the risk and how it turned out?

The riskiest thing I’ve ever done was moving from New Jersey to California to pursue a nursing degree at Fresno State. I was only 18 years old and I didn’t know anyone in California. I had to support myself and I needed straight A’s, even though I had been mostly a B or C student in high school. I had to take certain classes before applying to the nursing program itself and my grades determined whether I got admitted or not. I also had to establish residency in California to get into the program. I just took inventory of what needed to be done and got to work.
I showed up prepared to do whatever the professors told me to do. I biked down Shaw Avenue to fill out job applications, read every word of every chapter assigned to me, handed all of the assignments on time, and went to every single class. I didn’t have much of a social life between working and studying and I sacrificed a lot of comfort to get by. It took me six years to graduate, but I graduated with highest honors and a minor in Spanish. I could go on and on about my nursing career, but I’ll tell you I was meant for this work and it was the best decision of my life. I wouldn’t have the opportunity to be a freelance makeup artist if it weren’t for the flexibility nursing has to offer.
I moved to LA in 2023, which is more of what I pictured all those years ago when I dreamed of moving to California. I do miss Fresno sometimes, though, I’m not gonna lie. Almost everyone I met there was kind and I got a lot of help from the goodness of people’s hearts, especially in the beginning. I miss the hospital I used to work at and the punk scene. I met my now boyfriend in Fresno. I can’t say the same about New Jersey, but my best friend lives there. My twelfth grade Environmental Science teacher told me, after I told him I got accepted to Fresno State, that I shouldn’t even attempt going to a state university because I can’t handle science at that level. The important thing is that I was inspired and I believed I was capable. Only because I bet on myself, I know what I am capable of now.

Mascara, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

My life didn’t come together right away after I started working as a nurse. I worked through the pandemic and by that time I went through years of hardly wearing makeup. I was feeling really stuck in a rut for a while. I forgot how to have fun and I didn’t even really know what my interests were. You know how bad things in life happen all together sometimes? Basically that’s what happened from 2020-2022, right after I graduated.

I finally made a lot of serious changes to my life and started playing with makeup again because I was newly single. Makeup quickly became an outlet for creative expression and I literally was creating a new version of myself. I somehow acquired a ColourPop eyeshadow pallet, which is how I started experimenting with bold, fun colors. I actually completely missed the 2016 era of makeup so I was just discovering things like a cut crease, halo eye, and graphic liner. Once I combined bold colors with these more complex styles, I realized that the possibilities are endless when it comes to makeup.

I think once I realized I never had to do the same makeup look twice, I became obsessed with it. The variety excited me as much as the makeup did. I’m a Gemini, so I tend to get bored easily. I painted when I was younger, but makeup stimulated me in a way painting didn’t. Unlike paint on a canvas, makeup is alive, dynamic, and temporary. Photography can immortalize a look. I’m neither a photographer or a model and as I said, I get bored easily, so I want to pursue makeup professionally. Personally, I don’t enjoy filming myself or social media marketing. Working with other artists will give me more satisfying opportunities. I still paint and refurbish old furniture as hobbies.

I’m most proud of the hope my work has given to people I have never met. I found out that my work was shared at an art therapy class in a rehab for substance abuse. That really solidified for me why I do what I do. I’m not afraid to experiment, I love working with people, and I am in this business for the positive impact makeup artistry has on our minds and souls. I love colorful, avant garde, high contrast looks the most, but I have a diverse skill set that I’m still expanding upon. I’m always up for a challenge because that’s how I grow!

We often hear about learning lessons – but just as important is unlearning lessons. Have you ever had to unlearn a lesson?

I had to unlearn the idea that external validation would legitimize me somehow. There isn’t a set path to become a makeup artist, unlike nursing. Becoming a nurse a step-by-step process and once you get your license, you can call yourself a nurse. It was easier, in a way, to have a set path with certain benchmarks I needed to hit in order to succeed. When I do a look, I don’t get a scantron back with a grade on it. You can believe you’re a nurse, but you won’t get anywhere without a license. With makeup, the important thing is that I believe I am worthy of calling myself a makeup artist. I have to stand by my skills, my work ethic, my manners, and my passion first before anyone else does.

It’s not lost on me that my vision requires external validation because it revolves around collaboration with others. I just approach this fact with an abundance mindset, where I believe I will find the people who I resonate with and appreciate what I have to offer. My ability to find and connect with those individuals depends on my ability to be really honest with myself and creating from a raw place. I’m okay with taking longer to find my place in this industry if it means I get to keep my joy while doing what I do. I’m open to a variety of opportunities and I’ve always thrived in environments where I have to adapt and be flexible. I like the idea of working on projects where someone else is in charge of creative direction because that mimics what life is actually like. You have to make the most of whatever conditions you are given. Every MUA is going to approach those conditions in their own special way, and our uniqueness shines through in anything we execute.

Is there something you think non-creatives will struggle to understand about your journey as a creative? Maybe you can provide some insight – you never know who might benefit from the enlightenment.

A lot of creatives feel misunderstood, but I don’t think it’s because there are “creatives” and “non-creatives”. There was a time in my life where I wasn’t tapped into my creativity and anything I tried felt awkward and wrong. You can be very gifted, but if you are afraid of yourself or are living in survival mode, shrinking yourself feels safer than exploring yourself. People who aren’t utilizing their creative energy might simply fear that what they have to offer isn’t “good enough”. I had to get to a place where I could tolerate rejection. It takes courage to chase your dreams. Life is like food, it needs to be eaten up before it expires or it will go to waste.

Art is a way of relating to the world. There are so many barriers to genuine connection with nature, with others, and ourselves. Good art cuts right through that. I haven’t found many other solutions to my problems that don’t require me to fix anything. I think good art doesn’t censor anything, it requires you to be raw and even messy, sometimes. I have walked through life guarded and I’ve walked through life raw and messy, but the results were the same. Either way, I’m vulnerable to being misunderstood. It takes a special person to be able to accept people as they are, but almost anyone can appreciate art. When I do makeup it’s like I’m screaming at the top of my lungs because my life amounts to more than a problem that needs solving. One of my favorite poems, Wild Geese, by Mary Oliver articulates this sentiment beautifully:

“You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting –
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.”

Contact Info:

• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/xx.mascara_beetle.xx?igsh=MWQ1ZGUxMzBkMA==
• Other: email: [email protected]