We recently connected with Koco Collab (Aiko Szymczak & Corinne Trujillo) and have shared our conversation below.
Koco Collab (Aiko Szymczak & Corinne Trujillo), first a big thank you for taking the time to share your thoughts and insights with us today. I’m sure many of our readers will benefit from your wisdom, and one of the areas where we think your insight might be most helpful is related to imposter syndrome. Imposter syndrome is holding so many people back from reaching their true and highest potential and so we’d love to hear about your journey and how you overcame imposter syndrome.
A: We use it to our advantage by putting our heads down and working hard towards our goals.
C: It can be a tool we use when pushing ourselves technically and conceptual. It definitely helps working as a team; we can support each other and cheer each other on when we are feeling this way.
Let’s take a small detour – maybe you can share a bit about yourself before we dive back into some of the other questions we had for you?
We are a creative small business ran by Aiko Szymczak & Corinne Trujillo. We paint murals, paintings, upcycle and hand embroider clothing, binds books from scratch and more. We love being able to focus on many forms of creativity and we especially love painting BIG. By starting Koco Collab, we were able to make a platform that allows us to explore various mediums, messages and methods. As painters, we both separately like to paint feminine portraiture and explore complex emotions. We bring our styles together to create work that touches on themes of being BIPOC women, mental health and weaving our histories into new stories. For our mural work, we love being able to paint underrepresented people in the community, speak to mental health awareness and bring hopefully imagery into communities.
This upcoming year we are organizing a series of murals and events called Make Them Visible. This project will focus on opioid awareness and speak to the epidemic that is happening in our country. We plan to launch three new murals in the Denver area next Spring/Summer.
Looking back, what do you think were the three qualities, skills, or areas of knowledge that were most impactful in your journey? What advice do you have for folks who are early in their journey in terms of how they can best develop or improve on these?
A: Dedication, creative problem-solving and efficiency. Don’t give up and don’t compare yourself to other people. There is always worse and always better. Take it day by day. Baby steps.
C: Communication, perseverance and taking things lightly. Things will always go wrong but exercising gratitude everyday can help overcome and ease the strife.
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?
Our business mentor, Steve, has helped us learn the ropes of running our own smaller business. We can come to him for advice and questions. He has helped us think more longterm and gives us another perspective on running our creative business.
Our manager, Mary, has been working with us to get more projects and has also connected us to more opportunities in Denver. We are able to get help on grants and applications and use her vast experience to progress our career.
Each other! Partnering up has definitely pushed each of our artist careers. We are able to bounce ideas off each other, give each other constructive criticism and help each other up when we are struggling. We each bring new skills and information to the table are able to coach and teach each other every day.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.kococollab.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/kococollab/
- Other: https://www.etsy.com/shop/KocoCollab
Image Credits
Joe Freemond Cam Margera Peter Kowalchuk Aiko Szymczak
