Shed Your Skin

"Shed Your Skin" is a tapestry of storytelling and symbolism, woven with hope and defiance. I am Surreal24seven, born in the vibrant pulse of New York City, where its rhythmic energy and beauty shaped my soul. But life shattered when my father’s factory - our family’s livelihood - was violently seized by thieves in Guatemala. Stranded, I survived on $2 an hour working in a hostel, confined to a cockroach-infested room the size of a closet, its faint WiFi my only lifeline. For six years, I didn’t leave that windowless space, strangers drifting past like shadows. There, in isolation, art became my rebellion - a surreal cry against a world that tried to break me. "Shed Your Skin" mirrors my story in a woman whose skin bears butterfly and caterpillar tattoos - each etched line a wound of survival, a map of rebirth. She sits in a glass box, echoing my years of seclusion, her laptop casting a soft glow of plans for a new life in Chicago. Suitcases beneath her pulse with the promise of that move - a chapter yet to unfold. A cat on her lap, fierce and untamed, embodies the spirit that defies confinement. Outside, a restless street hums with strange, unfamiliar faces - a world I’ll need time to navigate after years alone. Billboards flare with surreal visions - snakes coiling into new forms, butterflies weaving a woman’s dress, their vivid imagery murmuring transformation, urging her onward. Above, a vast starry sky unfurls, its shimmering expanse a beacon of hope beyond her walls. A surreal anthem, echoing the relentless fight to reclaim one’s life and hope - for those rebuilding from ruin. It’s about confinement, yes - but more about escape. "Shed Your Skin" reminds us: even in the darkest box, transformation is possible. And sometimes, that spark of change is all we need to begin again!!!!