In the deepest moments of sorrow, the most beautiful revelations can be discovered. For freshman visual art design student, Robert Xavier art became his paradise to escape life’s turmoil.

From organizing his own art show to being asked to contribute to a potential mural in the new student union,  Xavier is making big waves within the campus community.

After being tagged in a post on Instagram that was searching for talented graphic designers under the NCAT18 Student Government Association page, Xavier knew he was defying odds already set against him.

“Being a freshman, people already like to place you in a box and limit you,” Xavier expressed.  “For me being asked to help create a mural for the senior class for the new student union was amazing. It’s like a piece of me is going to be apart of NCAT forever.”

Along with one other talented artist, Xavier will have the complete range to create a mural that reflects the campus community.

“I want to create something that is non-typical of the university,” Xavier said. “A piece where you would really have to sit down and think of its symbolism.”

His passion was not something created overnight but has been a process of trial and error that was accompanied by extreme highs and lows.

“My interest in art started from the very beginning when I used to see my sister draw,” Xavier expressed. “I picked up a marker and copied what she did. I went to middle school and started to copy cartoons.  I started growing freshmen year of high school. That’s when I started to master it.  I started using emotions and life experience to capture my artwork.”

Primarily using markers to illustrate his creative vision, Xavier hopes to better his painting skills to create more works on a grander scale. Xavier also has hopes to continue his women-focused art and to eventually produce an aesthetic similar to Janelle Monae.

“The work I do is so detailed and grand; I want to get it on a scale where people can actually see it from afar rather than close up with paintings instead of drawings,” Xavier explained.

However, his artistic evolution reached new heights when he coordinated an art show on Good Friday that focused on his collections. The art show was going to have a collective theme, but life had a different plan for the show.

“It was going to have a theme, but life doesn’t go as planned,” Xavier explained. “It was going to be a  rainbow theme. I made 60 little cards all with 20 different pictures of me on it.   It had a smeared spectrum of the rainbow on it and  I wrote in brail on the back ‘my love cannot be seen but felt’.”

Xavier connected how the rainbow theme was going to allude to the promises God makes when he sent Noah to the arch.

“It was all a promise. I was promising to fill in the vacant hues. The day before and day of the show a lot of promises fell through,” Xavier expressed.

Not only was this Xavier’s debut solo art show, but one of the first moments where his testimony became public.

“I finished a piece that I wasn’t originally going to have for the show because it was about how I almost took my own life,” Xavier said. “I don’t have a name for it. It might be called June 22nd because that’s the day it all would have happened.”

Xavier finds reassurance in his artwork when it reaches people. He prides himself on his ability to connect with people through his work.

“That piece touched a lot of people. It was this girl who wasn’t even going to come who broke down crying because how it inspired her,” Xavier said. “Art can touch people more than you think it can. I stay true to myself.”

For Xavier, art was sometimes the only place to find refuge away from an abusive father and mental instability. Coming from an abusive home and an addictive family background, art is more than just striking a marker against a  paper, but it is his peace.

“I touch more people than I actually realize it. I want to create to where I’m peaceful with it and to make other people peaceful without realizing it.”

Whatever the future holds for Robert Xavier, it is clear that it will be a rainbow of much success painted with the delicate hands of time.