DreamSpring’s Maker MasterMind series is a monthly conversation featuring creative entrepreneurs who are building businesses, creating art, and making an impact. Presented as part of our DreamCreative initiative for creative small businesses, this virtual series offers personal stories and practical advice to entrepreneurs in the creative industries.

This November we host a conversation with Byron Ramos, whose artistic journey started while in Army Special Forces taking photos as a hobby during training operations. His training operations often involved conducting maritime rescue operations and supporting elite dive teams as a mechanic. Byron spent much of his time traveling across the United States and meeting people from across the country and immigrants from around the world’s most war-torn regions.

His exposure to all these people’s experiences encouraged him to develop his expressiveness as an artist and he began experimenting with urban photography and color enhancement, trying to look for ways to input his Latino Heritage into his photography. However, after leaving the Army, he found a special affinity for merging the idea of stone with the sea.

His time in the military informs his sculpture. The core idea is that everyone shares the universal experience of migration. Every person has had to move since the first people. This Human activity is the bond that leads to all experiences, and that by reminding people of that universal human experience, to inspire them to treat those who are currently in transition, with kindness.

Because to migrate, is to be Human.