Pinqy Ring

So excited for these next two years with Healing Arts Chicago, bringing Hip Hop and healing together in Pilsen and beyond. 🩷

Bring your story 📝 Join us every Wednesday from 6:00–7:30 PM for the Hip Hop Healing Cypher at 1713 S. Ashland. 🌸

Register: bit.ly/healingcypher 💫

🌸 And we back, and we back 🌸 Honored to be back at Lollapalooza with my familia John Walt Foundation, hosting our new showcase on the Bonus Track Stage! 🎙️

Getting to represent Chicago and uplift the next generation of artists on one of the biggest festival stages in the world is something I’ll never take for granted.

Y’all know me, and you know there’s nothing I love more than championing and uplifting young artists 🤩 Come join us as we spotlight incredible talent, community, and the next generation of creatives.

Featuring:
🔥 Juby DaGod
🔥 mai jennasis
🔥 snacksPIVOT
🔥 𝓋𝒾𝒸𝓉ℴ𝓇𝓎
🔥 DJ Tai

You won’t want to miss this 🩷
See you Sunday @ 5pm! ✨ ¡Wepa! 💃🏻

Hip Hop was my healing long before I had the language for what I was carrying… I never imagined it would one day become my life’s work 🥹

Today, I’m honored to share two free creative wellness offerings I’ll be facilitating in Pilsen through ! 🌸

💫 Hip Hop Healing Cypher – a weekly community space to write, reflect, connect, and heal through Hip Hop.

🎙️ Mic Check – a virtual one-on-one creative wellness sessions rooted in conversation, creativity, and goal setting.

All offerings are free, and the first Hip Hop Healing Cypher begins the week of July 27 🗓️

Register for The Hip Hop Healing Cypher at the link in my bio. If you’re interested in scheduling a private one-on-one Mic Check session, send me a DM and I’ll share the scheduling link 🔗

Whether you’ve been part of Hip Hop your whole life or you’re simply looking for a space to breathe, reflect, and be heard, I’d love to welcome you 🩷

Chicago… let’s build something beautiful together ✨

Brought to you by: Chicago DCASE CDPH Malcolm X College 🌸

Photo: Maija Martin⚡️Chicago Brand Photographer 📸

No Kings. No Colonies. 🇵🇷

As the United States celebrates 250 years of “independence”, we gather in Barrio Borikén to remember that Puerto Rico remains one of the world’s oldest colonies.

For me, the Fourth of July has never been about fireworks. It’s about remembering that liberation remains unfinished work.

I’m honored to lend my voice to a gathering rooted in culture, community, and the ongoing struggle for a free Puerto Rico.

Hip Hop has always taught me that our liberation is bound together. Tomorrow, I stand with Puerto Rico in solidarity with all peoples still resisting colonization, occupation, displacement, and empire.

May we all inherit the freedom our ancestors dreamed of 🕯️

¡Que viva Puerto Rico libre! 🇵🇷✊🏽

Photos 📸 Maija Martin⚡️Chicago Brand Photographer
Makeup 💄 LIZ KHALIFA Chicago Makeup Artist

Borikén 🫱🏽‍🫲🏾 Hip Hop 🫱🏽‍🫲🏾 The Chi. ✨🇵🇷🎙️

There is something deeply beautiful about watching Puerto Rican lyricism travel across waters, generations, and neighborhoods, reminding us that Hip Hop has always been a bridge home.

If you know me, you know three things: I’m very Chicago. Very Puerto Rican. And very Hip Hop.

That’s why I’m especially honored to be part of Nuestra Lírica this Saturday July 4th, an evening celebrating the revolutionary tradition of Puerto Rican lyricism from the island to Chicago.

I’m also incredibly excited to share the stage for the very first time with my friend and our Chicago Poet Laureate, Mayda Del Valle, alongside legends like Siete Nueve "El Cimarrón" and eL S. Vidal Quintero 🔥

Skip the fireworks. Come get these Boricua bars 🇵🇷🎤😎

Tickets are available through the Segundo Ruiz Belvis 🎟️

¡Wepa! 💃🏻

If you know me, you know I love Hip Hop. You also know I’ve been putting in work for a ✨long time✨

There have been many seasons where I felt overlooked, wondering if people were seeing my talent, my heart, my purpose, and the way I’ve carried Chicago with me around the world.

Y’all, I prayed for someone like Murs 🤲🏼

The first time he saw me rap, he grabbed me by the arm and was like, “YOOOOO… WHAT?!” 🤣 He got so excited he forgot I wasn’t one of the guys 🥹

Pero, honestly… isn’t that what rap is supposed to do? It should move you. It should make you feel something. It should leave your body reacting before your mind catches up.

So, to be invited to perform at Good Waves by Groundwaves alongside artists I’ve admired for years like Killer Mike, SNOW THA PRODUCT, The Homegirl Rapsody 💋, djpremier, Dee-1, and so many incredible members of my Chicago Hip Hop community is something I don’t take lightly.

It feels like one of those moments where preparation finally meets recognition. And I’ve been preparing for this moment, this stage, since I picked up a pen at Lane Tech High School 📝

I’m coming with new music. I’m coming with gratitude. I’m coming with comunidad. I’m coming with ¡Wepa! 🇵🇷 And I’m ready to leave a piece of myself on that stage 🌸

My ancestors really did their biggest one 🕯️😌

Chicago… Nos vemos at Good Waves!
😎🩷🎤

Some of my favorite photos of myself are the ones I didn’t take. The ones where someone is simply witnessing me… 🌸

🍃 I was wandering through Central Park, taking in the rare gift of moving slowly, when a woman stopped me and asked if she could take my picture because I reminded her of her daughter.

🎤 My bestie, Jazzmyn Rodrigues, captured me mid-facilitation at the HipHopEd Conference, completely immersed in the work I love (with clicker in hand 🤓🤣).

🎥 I was filming a promo reel about my work when Kayla Cymone, a brilliant creative I had the joy of working with for the first time, captured one of those beautiful in-between moments. The camera stopped rolling, but my story was not finished.

I don’t think they’ll ever know how much I treasure the photos they took.

We spend so much time trying to control how we’re seen that we forget people are often falling in love with the parts of us that aren’t curated at all.

These photos remind me that maybe I don’t have to perform being me. Maybe I just have to keep showing up. And trust that someone, somewhere, will see the beauty I would’ve missed myself.

May we all be witnessed with this kind of tenderness. 🩷