Camila Rosa & Emily Ding
There’s a moment early in this day where everything feels quiet.
Not silent. Just attentive.
The kind of quiet where the city keeps moving, but you’re suddenly aware of the cracks in the sidewalk, the way color bleeds into shadow, the way a passing face lingers longer than it should. This episode lives in that space. Between noticing and making.
This is a Field Trip with Camila Rosa and Emily Ding. Two artists. Two languages of color. One shared instinct to pay attention.
Camila talks about walking. About people. About seeing women everywhere and deciding, early on, that she wanted to paint them as unshakable. Not fragile. Not ornamental. Present. Her figures are built with restraint. Two to four colors. High contrast. No room to hide.
“With a small palette, I can communicate better.”
There’s something almost defiant about that choice. Fewer colors. Louder intention. Her work doesn’t ask for permission. It stands its ground. Feminine without softness being mistaken for weakness. Bold without apology.
Emily’s world arrives differently.
Her process begins with a feeling. Or a color. Or a walk through the neighborhood where the leaves in the sidewalk cracks matter just as much as the walls she’ll eventually paint. Her murals feel like they’re still breathing. Pastels layered until instinct and emotion blur together.
“I start off with a feeling or a color that I’m trying to express.”
Animals move through her work like metaphors you don’t need explained. Creatures mid-motion. Stories embedded quietly. She talks about fairy tales, about morals hidden inside dreamlike scenes, about learning how to let go even when it leaves claw marks.
That line hangs in the air longer than expected.
What’s striking is how different their work looks and how similar their why feels.
Both are chasing connection. Both are translating emotion into form. Both are trusting that if they’re honest enough, someone standing in front of the work will see themselves reflected back.
Camila describes creating one character and placing her everywhere. Protesting. Walking. Searching. Existing. Emily talks about viewers stepping back from a mural and saying, “Oh my god, this feels like me.”
That’s the exchange. Artist to world. World to artist. Back and forth.
As the conversation moves, the contrast sharpens. Camila’s impact versus Emily’s softness. Precision versus diffusion. Control versus surrender. But the tension isn’t a divide. It’s a duet.
They remind us that inspiration isn’t rare. It’s overlooked.
A bush on a city street. A color shift. A passing conversation. A feeling you don’t fully understand yet.
The world is already offering material.
The work is noticing it.
The work is choosing.
The work is trusting that what you’re chasing might already be chasing you back.
And as we leave this Field Trip, nothing feels wrapped up. It feels open. Like a walk you haven’t finished yet.