Devika Sen, a sophomore graphic design major from the small town of Woodland, California, talks with me about her artistic genes, a childhood love for creating, her new "Angry Girls" series, and future goals all in the first ever Pratt Profiles interview!

What was your childhood like? Were you always into art?

I actually learned how to hold a pencil before I could talk, I would draw circle after circle on the back of my dad's pay stubs. He also taught me how to use watercolor paint, and he got me an easel and taught me how to paint clouds. Both of my grandmothers on either side were both artists. When my parents noticed that I also was really into art, they started buying me sketchbooks and I would fill them up completely. When I learned the alphabet, I would just write it over and over again in my sketchbooks. I also doodled on "Magnadoodles," and my mom would take a Polaroid of me and the doodle. I eventually took art lessons when I got older. I lived in India for a year and I had a private art teacher even though I was like, five, and I learned a lot from it. I still use the stuff I learned from back then! I remember when email became popular, my sister and my friends and I had an "e-newsletter," and I was the editor of it. I actually really wanted to be a writer, so I went back and forth in high school about whether I wanted to write or do art. After my first year of art classes, my art teacher asked me to join AP art, but I waited a year. My family and I went to India the summer before senior year, right before I had to start applying for colleges and while I was there, my grandmother told me about my great-great-great grandmother. She had an arranged marriage when she was eight years old, and when she had to go live with her husband's family, her mother sent her pens and paper because she loved to draw. She would draw all day, and she made these intricate floral patterns. She had no formal training, but her shapes were perfect. All of a sudden I felt really connected to that part of me, and felt that art was something I needed to pursue.

Were there any pivotal moments that really set you on the path that you're on now as an artist?

The best moment of my life so far is when I sold my first painting! It was freshman year in high school, and I painted something for childhood cancer awareness. My piece was chosen to be in the Sacramento Artwalk, which was a big deal. It was framed and everything. I was watching people look at my piece and I saw this women call the coordinator of the show over to mine, and then she came up to me and said, "There is somebody who would like to buy your work!" She told me that the lady wanted to meet me because she couldn't believe that the work was done by a high school freshman. I don't even remember how much it was sold for, but she owned a family wellness center and she said she was going to hang it up there. I was actually crying so much from happiness! It was also just a really big moment because I guess it taught me about letting my work go, since it was just one original painting that I wouldn't have anymore, and how to deal with that.

Another huge impact on my life was finding the TANA, or Taller Arte del Nuevo Amanecer (Art Workshop of the New Dawn), a full functioning silkscreen studio started with a grant from University of California, Davis. It's located in an underprivileged, undeserved area of my town, and is a place for teenagers to go and create art about things they care about. Silkscreen printing has a big history in Mexican and Cuban revolutions, and that really got me into art activism. I started silkscreen printing my second year of high school, and I learned a lot of what I know from that studio. Gilda Posada, and Oakland-based printmaker, worked there at the time and she taught me so much about color and the print process --she's still a big influence and a great friend. That studio was the best environment; I would stay there printing for hours. Eventually I was able to teach others the process, and was able to help out with a college class.

How has moving to New York and/or coming to Pratt influenced you?

I realized back in California, and back at the silkscreen studio, that there was a huge sense of community. You have to talk out your ideas to people to be able to create them, there is no other way. Even in the studio, there was a list of rules you had to follow. It was "No headphones. Help the people around you and ask for help if you need it." When I came here to New York and to Pratt, I noticed that art seems like a individual thing. People will just be alone in their studio for hours and I don't get that. You'll only be able to create from your own head and thoughts that way, and that only gets you so far. I think of art as more than myself, I think it should totally be a community thing.

What kind of work are you doing now?

Since I'm at school, I'm doing a lot of school-based assignments. I also started an "Angry Girls" series based on sketches from my notebook. It's great because it works with any medium. I started in ink and then I did linoleum prints, and those got used in other students pieces for a collaboration assignment, which was really cool. Went I went back home for a break, I did a silkscreen print of it and it says, "Unapologetically angry girls, they're tired of your sh*t." Which I think is great; girls can be angry and they have every right to be angry. I'm also always doing prints and selling them. I recently finished two editions of a print called "The Feminist Alphabet," which took me a year to finish, and the positive response was something I never expected. When I posted it to social media, people I haven't talked to in years started contacting me about wanting a print. My work can get a little graphic sometimes- one print called "The Rape of Liberty" shows Uncle Sam shoving the American flag between The Statue of Liberty's legs. I made that when there were a lot of restrictions being placed on women's reproductive health care. I literally just think "What's making me mad right now?" and then I create something.

Any plans or ideas of what you'd like to be doing in the future?

I really want to go back to doing something like I did when I was little, the e-newsletter type of thing. I really want to work in publications, but be apart of the writing side and the creative side. I want to start a zine, and I also really hope to soon have an online shop of my prints for people to buy.

Devika's work can be found here and you can also stay up to date on her newer projects and contact her about purchasing a print by following her on Instagram at @Devikhan!