CSSSA College Connection Visits Cornish College of the Arts
Pablo Lopez has found his college fit at Cornish.
Life is very rarely a straight line from point A to point B, but more often a zig-zag path that weaves in and out of one’s sight-line. Nothing could be truer than for Pablo Lopez, currently attending Cornish College of the Arts in Seattle, WA. After attending University of California Davis for a year, Pablo knew he needed to be somewhere else. He was inspired by the theatre activism he found at California State Summer School for the Arts (CSSSA) and wanted a college with that kind of community, but he didn’t know how to find it.
Pablo withdrew from UC Davis and took a year off to explore his options.
“I want to redefine it (theatre) for my own practice, for my own career…so part of the college search was looking for colleges that embraced that kind of thinking.”
In a classic example of synchronicity, Pablo discovered Cornish College of the Arts quite by mistake while working as an intern for the CSSSA Foundation. After doing some more research, he decided to apply and audition.
After a very long 24 hour Greyhound bus ride to Seattle, Pablo had a transformative audition experience with Cornish faculty, Sheila Daniels, “it was really in the moment, back and forth, and I was excited about having a teacher like that.”
A few weeks later, Pablo received his letter of admission with a handwritten note from Sheila, which said, “…so excited for you to be here!”
“That was really a personal achievement for me, and…you know…I’m proud of it.”
Seattle is known as a literary and introspective city. This fact and the distance from home has given Pablo the opportunity to figure out who he is outside of his familiar surroundings. “Back at home I would be totally connected and totally involved and totally…distracted…Being here and being alone has given me time, has given me space, and it’s kind of made my canvas blank.”
The CSSSA Foundation’s CSSSA College Connection is a web-series featuring CSSSA alumni in their college setting. The series is about the human element of connection, providing peer-to-peer insight regarding the college process in the context of the arch of an individual’s life journey.
