‘Without community, you’re missing something’: How one Miami student is using social media and art to build a community

In October 2017, Isa Obradovich laid out her sketchbook with a colored pencil drawing of a mermaid, snapped a photo and posted it to Instagram.

Students from her middle school liked the post and commented on her artistic ability. She had only been drawing for a little more than two years, but the validation was enough for her to keep going.

A year later, she reached 10,000 followers on the social media app. Now, she has more than 170,000 followers on Instagram and a million followers on TikTok. Her social media accounts consist of progress pictures, process videos and finished products, but she doesn’t consider herself an influencer.

Photo by Alice Momany | The Miami Student
A sketch of a mermaid became the first piece of art Obradovich posted to her Instagram.

“I’m an artist and an educator first, and then I also do content creation on the side,” said Obradovich, a sophomore art education major at Miami University.

Many of her life experiences were shaped by the teachers she’s had along the way, which is a big part of why she wants to work in education.

In addition to studying art education, Obradovich is working toward her endorsement certification for Teaching in English to Speakers of Other Languages to become an art teacher for English language learners.

Obradovich is French-Peruvian, and English is her third language. She grew up speaking French and Spanish at home, but once she got to preschool, she knew she was different. While the other children were learning the color purple from yellow, her music teacher, who was the only teacher at the school who spoke Spanish, worked with Obradovich to learn English.

“Just having someone there who cared and was taking the time and effort to help me get acclimated to [the culture] … and be there for the kids who feel like they don’t fit in, who feel so behind, who feel so isolated, is something that I want to do,” Obradovich said.

In the second grade, she knew she wanted to become a teacher when working on a worksheet about the weather, but it wasn’t until she switched middle schools that her interest in art peaked.

“In middle school, I had the most incredible art teacher,” Obradovich said. “He believed in me and saw my worth and my value, not only as an artist but also as a human being.”

Charles Raubacher, Obradovich’s middle school art teacher, said he remembered her coming into his classroom to draw during lunch or staying after school to work on her pieces. Inspired by her dedication and talent, he began to give her more challenging assignments that went beyond the regular requirements of the class.

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“Typically, I would almost force every student to do the same assignments, but with her, I did not do that,” Raubacher said.

Obradovich goes back to Raubacher’s classroom to help out in various ways, hoping that one day, she will be that person for others.

Raubacher, who taught Obradovich when she first started on Instagram, said he wasn’t surprised to see her gain a mass following.

“She was using social media the way it’s supposed to be used, in a positive manner, trying to reach out and get feedback,” he said. “But she was also communicating and spreading her art, which is difficult.”

Obradovich also manages her account, meaning she responds to all of her own emails, signs all of her contracts and decides which brands to partner with. While the business side of social media is taxing, she said the toxicity is worse.

“Once you get to a certain point of having attention on you, some of it’s bound to be negative,” Obradovich said. “There were so many times where I quit. I was like, ‘I’m never doing this again … I’m not going to come back.’”

But then, she did.

“I made a lot of friends on there at a time when I didn’t really have that many people to rely on,” Obradovich said. “I made a lot of lifelong friends on the internet … They mean so much to me, and I just couldn’t let that go.”

Photo by Alice Momany | The Miami Student

Obradovich hopes her future students will be as passionate about art as she is.

A common theme reflected throughout Obradovich’s social media and in her day-to-day life is community. Her dream is to connect her platform on social media with education.

“Without community, you’re missing something,” Obradovich said. “That’s what I was missing for forever … When you find your community in real life, that’s really special.”

At Miami, Obradovich already has some experience teaching as an undergraduate assistant (UA) for Jordan Fenton, an associate professor of art history. She took Fenton’s ART162 African, Oceania and Native American art history class in the spring of her first year, and it quickly became a favorite. She enjoyed learning about non-Western art and the struggles of colonization that indigenous communities experienced.

Her natural enjoyment of the course motivated her to be an active participant in the class, prompting Fenton to ask her to be a UA. An educator himself, Fenton said students like Obradovich make him confident in the future of art education.

“In this particular moment in society, in higher education, and education in general, the humanities, the arts, are not given the value they deserve, and that’s unfortunate,” Fenton said. “Knowing that I have the opportunity to help, mentor, teach, and push Isa to the next level, I’m confident that our future is safe in the hands of someone like Isa.”

Despite being warned about the future of the education landscape, Obradovich can’t wait to instill in her students the drive to be a champion for the arts.

“You only hear about the bad things, you don’t hear about the one student whose life was changed for the better by an educator who really believed in them,” Obradovich said, reflecting on the many who believe in her. “But I think that’s important to continue.”

momanyaj@miamioh.edu