About Lelia Thomas
I’m a 22-year-old American who is living down under in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. I am a southerner by heritage (Mississippi-born) and moved to Melbourne from small-town Tennessee in mid-2006. (Yes, I do occasionally say “y’all.”) I’m an artist and writer, and I’m interested in new media in education. Politically speaking, I’m libertarian, and I am morally suspect when it comes to my sense of humor.
As of this year, I have finished my studies at Swinburne University of Technology. Barring anything going absurdly wrong, this will give me a bachelor’s degree in multimedia and media studies. In it, I focused on media theory, network (Internet) sociology, creative writing and design. In other words, I paid an exorbitant amount to do what I was already doing. From my understanding, this tends to be the essence of tertiary education.
I am engaged to an awesome, geeky Australian programmer, Andrew, who I met at paintball (yes, paintball) in 2007. We will move to the Las Vegas, Nevada area in late 2009, get hitched sans Elvis, and begin a late-to-bed-late-to-rise lifestyle of freelancing web development (him) and design (me). If you’re from the Vegas area and would like to meet up sometime when we get there, drop me a line. We’re friendly Internet folk.
I am an artist and web/graphic designer.
Like most kids, I think, I enjoyed coloring in the lines and drawing simple things. It wasn’t until I had a wonderful art teacher in fifth and sixth grade that I really opened up to art and much of creativity. Good teachers can inspire great things in people, and this is what happened for me. Having someone encourage me and spark my interest in art was all it took for me to pursue it wholeheartedly.
While traditional media will always be special to me, digital technologies have given me the ability to create pieces which I could never make in a traditional medium. The act of digital art construction has also made me more aware of the need for copyright reform, which is now very close to my heart. Today, I can be seen creating detailed photo montages and digital paintings with an Intuos3 Wacom tablet. I also create accessible, usable web designs and code a little.
Fun Fact: I am a righty, not a lefty. Depending on how you feel about my artwork, this is either interesting or explanatory.
- See my self-published collection of written and visual works in “What We’re Made Of.” (To be released soon!)
- Subscribe to my portfolio’s RSS feed.
- Join me on RedBubble.
- Follow me on Imagekind.
- See me on The Untapped Source.
I am a creative writer and blogger.
Breaking the stereotype, I am not an alcoholic or heroin addict, just a writer. For years now, I have been interested in creative writing, tackling pieces of all sizes and, like most writers, finishing only a few of them. I began “blogging” in 2000, long before the term became ubiquitous, “cool” or profitable. My first blog was hosted with DiaryLand; and yes, that was a nightmare. From 2004 to 2008, I hosted a personal blog at this domain, which featured personal life stories, thoughts on mainstream media, politics and humor. Today, I write about art, new media issues and education, while hoping I don’t slip up and say anything too incriminating.
In 2006, I worked for a short time as a typesetter/web content manager, then lifestyles section editor at a small Tennessee newspaper that still needs to crawl out of the 90s and redesign its website. This year, I’ve done something more for love, than money. I have self-published a collection of my written and visual works: What We’re Made Of.
I am a PC gamer geek.
Yes, believe it. Girls are not only on the Interwebz these days, but some of us play games, too. I play all sorts of games, especially when I should be seeing to pesky responsibilities. I can be found quite often killing zombies or burning the house down as a pyro. A dream job for me would be to write a storyline for a video game.
