I’m Therese Basha Jarjoura, a Palestinian-American visual artist and storyteller originally from Nazareth, now based in Ann Arbor, Michigan. My creative practice moves between painting, writing, and mixed media, with a focus on memory, identity, belonging, resilience, and the emotional layers we carry through life. I work primarily with oil, acrylic, watercolor, charcoal, and pastel. My paintings are often impressionistic and abstract, built through layers of color, texture, scraping, covering, and revealing. I am interested in what remains underneath—not only in paint, but in people and memory. A previous mark may still appear beneath a new one, much like childhood, home, grief, and joy continue to exist beneath who we become. My work often begins with an ordinary moment: a street in Nazareth, a market, a familiar face, a gesture between people, or a memory I have carried for years. I don’t try to describe every detail. I leave areas suggestive so the viewer can enter the painting with their own memories and complete part of the story. I often think of myself as a writer using a brush instead of a pen. Each stroke holds part of a story, and each layer honors both what is visible and what is hidden. My hope is that although a painting may begin with my own experience, someone standing in front of it will recognize something from their own life.