Meet Jainson Cedillo

We were lucky to catch up with Jainson Cedillo recently and have shared our conversation below.

Jainson , appreciate you making time for us and sharing your wisdom with the community. So many of us go through similar pain points throughout our journeys and so hearing about how others overcame obstacles can be helpful. One of those struggles is keeping creativity alive despite all the stresses, challenges and problems we might be dealing with. How do you keep your creativity alive?

My creativity comes from my everyday consumption of pop culture and my Hispanic roots. What I have noticed recently is that a lot of my love of portraits comes from album covers. I collect them and use them as inspiration whenever I’m trying to think of some new material. Music is a big part of pop culture and my everyday life, the music I’m listening to, the lyrics that resonate with me, the album cover art that comes along with the songs. Those elements go into my brain and then come out as something new where my art takes over. I start to put in my own flavor, like my Ecuadorian roots, with symbols, colors, and figures that connect with me. So whenever I feel my creativity dying, I listen to music or expose myself to new cultures like museums, galleries, and exhibits that have art of now. Once I see something that interests me, I quickly digest it and spit out new ideas, sketches, and compositions with a new twist. Without having music, my roots, and pop culture art, my creativity would die. Weekly, I get new ideas of concepts to draw, they always change, just like pop culture, but what stays the same is my roots, the story I’m telling of myself or others as well, in a different way. I have a collection of vinyl and knowledge of artists of now who inspire what I make. The first vinyl that inspired my creativity is “Melodrama” by Lorde—that album started a whole journey for me.

Appreciate the insights and wisdom. Before we dig deeper and ask you about the skills that matter and more, maybe you can tell our readers about yourself?

Well, I’m Jainson Ronaldo Cedillo Jimenez—an artist, a future educator, and a proud husband. I love to make art, duh. I love to use a range of materials that fall under the drawing group, like any types of pencils, pastels, and markers, and I have a little bit of watercolor in my work as well. Using these materials, putting in the countless hours of covering small areas at a time on a big piece of paper, is a journey on its own, letting the viewer be able to see all those marks from each time I used the materials on the paper. What I do is tell a story of who I am and others as well, how they are connected to me somehow and now telling their own story completely. Making these traditional portraits in my own way, showcasing my roots and where I come from, and taking the viewer on a journey of what they’re looking at, that is what I do.
When making the art, it’s its own journey of emotions and thoughts while I am making it, but once it’s out in the world, it’s a whole different journey. Being able to see the viewer’s emotions and thoughts while they’re seeing it is so special and important to me. I am making them think about what they’re looking at, then interacting with them, with how it connects with them or asking to understand it and getting those first impressions is so special to me. I make art with the viewer’s perspective in mind as well. What are they going to think or say or realize while looking at it?
In my art, I always try to tell a story of the person who I’m drawing. If it is about me, that’s a bit easier to tell, but once it’s about someone else, I have to dig deeper. If you’ve seen my art, the ones about other people are usually connected to me somehow as a family member, a friend, or a co-worker. The story I’m telling is about them, so I usually want to get to know them to be able to feel right and know how to tell the story. Honestly, the ones that are of other people are, to me, the strongest pieces I have made in my career. My art is combined with bright colors, symbols, and usually centered around a figure somehow. A lot of the work is inspired by portrait artists and album cover art.
Throughout this year has been the busiest I have ever been, with exhibits, college, grant opportunities, and now having my first art sale near the end of the year, December 14 at 3-5 pm at the Meeting House Gallery in Columbia, Maryland, where you’ll be able to buy my art and prints of my art as well.

There is so much advice out there about all the different skills and qualities folks need to develop in order to succeed in today’s highly competitive environment and often it can feel overwhelming. So, if we had to break it down to just the three that matter most, which three skills or qualities would you focus on?

Looking back at my early years in school, one of the main things I’m proud of and don’t take for granted, even now, is whenever people give feedback on my work, even if it’s positive or negative. Some of the best feedback I got was from non-artists like my sister. She would tell me straight on if the face is off or she doesn’t like the color in a blunt way, which resulted in me having tough skin whenever receiving feedback. Non-artist feedback is the best because they will say the first thing that comes to mind without sugar coating it, without adding all that art vocabulary of what they really mean.
Another could be a good or bad quality of mine: being an overthinker, which translates to me staying on task with my art, making sure I get this artwork right. And overthinking so many different compositions for my portraits, and then that thinking translates to the material choice. This quality of mine helps me to stay on top of everything and helps to troubleshoot ideas I have, but where it can harm me is time consumption and energy lost. Thinking takes a lot of energy out of me, so I still need to find a balance.
Finally, my identity has impacted my journey. Once I knew who I was, that allowed me to make art that I want to make, not that I have to make. Those previous years of being lost, I was making art just to make it, not having a connection or real meaning behind it. But once I knew who I was, that gave me a purpose to make art and showed me who I am making this art for, and it allowed me to bloom into the artist I am now.
For the people just starting out, just like I was a few years ago: Yes, you can draw or paint, but why are you doing these things? If you’re doing it for a grade, you’re not passionate about it. But if you dig deeper into yourself and figure out who you are as a person, that relates to who you are as an artist. That translates to what you’re making feeling purposeful, a meaning of why and who you are making this art for. Art’s end goal for some people is to reach the world somehow. So being able to know who you are as an artist, all the pieces start to fall into place, and if they don’t, make them fall into place.

Okay, so before we go, is there anyone you’d like to shoutout for the role they’ve played in helping you develop the essential skills or overcome challenges along the way?

I never had a mentor in my career until Summer 2025, where I got the privilege to work with Amanda Burnham to guide me while I’m making art throughout the summer. This opportunity was given to me by Towson University winning a grant that allowed me to make my own art without having restrictions and being connected to public work, I had hosted workshops that relate to what I do in art. Having someone who has years in the business giving me one on one advice on how to improve myself as an artist. I feel like on my own I was going on a straight road going nowhere, but once I had that guidance, many paths opened up to me. Not only has my mentor Amanda helped my compositions and scale of my work, but also the exposure I have with art, telling me I should visit art exhibits weekly to help expose me to new art. Which that led to networking, creating new connections with other artists like myself. That helped me learn that as an artist, you have to be a social butterfly to get your art out there so people know who you are. You can make art, but who is going to get it out for the world to see? My mentor has helped me become a better artist in the sense of learning to develop a composition better, learning about new artists who influence me a lot now, and giving me a slice of what the world of being an artist is like: networking, having that studio practice of making art as a full-time artist, not just a student. Without her I would not had the chance to have my own group show with other amazing artist and create 5 amazing piece over the summer that I am proud off.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.jainsoncedillo.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/art_by_jainson/

Image Credits

I took the photos on my own or by family member