"Friends I Don't Have" is a series of small canvas paintings that explore the masks we wear and the invisible boundaries between strangers, acquaintances, and true intimacy. Each portrait depicts an imaginary person—someone I wished could be a friend but never became one, someone who orbits my life without real connection, or a stranger whose face I glimpsed once and never forgot.

The faces are framed by open masks, reminiscent of lucha libre wrestlers but deliberately incomplete. These masks don't conceal—they highlight. They represent the personas we construct for public consumption: the makeup we apply, the sunglasses we hide behind, the carefully curated versions of ourselves we present to the world. Unlike tattoos or permanent markings, these masks are temporary shields that dissolve when real intimacy emerges. When you truly know someone, you see them without their armor, without their performance.

Exploding from each head are bursts of color—amorphous shapes, silhouettes of animals and creatures, thought bubbles rendered in neon. These are the interior landscapes I wish we could see: the dreams, desires, fears, and fantasies that live invisibly inside everyone we pass. What if our thoughts were visible? What if strangers walked around broadcasting their inner worlds in vivid color? These paintings are my attempt to make that wish visible.

The visual language—bold neon colors, thick lines, high contrast—comes directly from my practice as a street artist. These paintings are an aggregation of what I learned creating wheat paste works for the street, where you have only seconds to catch someone's eye. The street taught me urgency, immediacy, and the power of color to stop someone mid-stride. I've brought that vocabulary indoors, transforming ephemeral street interventions into intimate portraits on canvas.

Ultimately, this series is about longing—for connection, for transparency, for a world where we could see each other more clearly. It's about the friends we don't have, the ones we almost had, and the beautiful strangeness of everyone we'll never really know.