As a kid, I was really artistic, at school I was always creative and talented in art class; I remember winning a drawing contest and I was already taking painting lessons in elementary school. As a young adult I've shifted my artistic energy into DJing. I was an Industrial DJ for goth events for about 5 years.
- Dj Cytotoxik Djing at Quebec City 2012
Everyone calls me Cyto, it's the diminutive of Cytotonik, and it’s my gamer handle. I'm a StarCraft 2 Player, a Platinum Protoss. Since I'm into StarCraft, I invested myself a lot in my Quebec community hosting weekly “Peepmode” events and my biggest production, the “Cytotournoi” tournaments. I was also in the organizing staff of the bi-weekly Online tournament called, ''Le gros tournoi'' and ''Les bigs du Québec''; Local tournaments reserved for Quebecers to support our players.
- OSHKO booth, Dreamhack Montreal 2019
I was an active streamer making multiple events for my local StarCraft community. I've also hosted for 8 months, before the pandemic, weekly IRL events called, “Rally Point” at The Esports Central, a big gaming bar in Montreal; an event focusing on free coaching. Each week I had good players from around the community and coaching the ones who need help to become better at playing StarCraft. It was my initiative to integrate more beginners from the Quebec StarCraft community with a friendly evening event.
In April 2019, I joined the All-Female Esports Team, ”Sailor Scouts”, becoming their first StarCraft player and was the first woman competing for the QSL (Québec Starcraft League). I know as a Platinum player I'm not a challenge in competition but my goal was to reduce disparity of the female player in Esports, to encourage and support all women who enter the world of competitive gaming; I have a mission and I'm always ready to fight against sexism and misogynistic comments. Unfortunately, in August 2020, the Starcraft 2 team of the Sailor Scouts was dissolved because of difficulties finding and keeping NA players. The team merged with another Canadian Team, “Mirage” and then becoming, “Mirage scouts”. I'm now on the social marketing team for Mirage scouts, still working to promote women in the Esports community.
https://twitter.com/miragescouts
- Team Sailor Scouts at Dreamhack Montreal 2019
In January of 2021, I decided to quit my career of 15 years as a pharmacy technician to be a full-time caregiver for my mother who was diagnosed with leukemia. I eventually had access to a large room that I slowly transformed into a streaming and painting room, I call it my studio. Having the necessary space for this type of art, I was able to let my inspiration run free and “farm” my creations as I like to say. Fluid art is very messy and you need space to let your canvas dry at level for 2 weeks between each layer.
- Hospital Hemato-Oncology room
In March of 2021, I was introduced into acrylic pouring techniques through one of my cousins, who too is an artist. I automatically developed an obsession with this kind of art and started creating some almost every day. I found something therapeutic in all these color combinations and creativity. It was then that I realized that I have more talent in art than on the ladder! Having more time to be creative, I started to paint and create my own fluid art techniques and started to master my specialty; StarCraft race symbols.
Shortly after, I decided to finally break the ice and start getting more involved in the English-speaking community, I was too shy before because of my accent since French is my native language. But every day I force myself to work on my English to communicate with the core of the StarCraft fans.
Then I launched my shopify shop to sell my artwork, I decided shopify was the best platform because of their support for the StarCraft community.
I started my series of paintings inspired by streamers of the StarCraft community; it was a really fun challenge. My goal was to get inspired by a streamer and bring out my creativity and find the colors that represent them the most (with their branding and overlay or style) and make an artwork where we can guess who it reflects. My inspiration where : Steadfast, Atira, ChikenMan, Dave Testa, Coconutgamezz, TRICIAxPAIN, RuFF_STuFF, BOOOOOOOOOoM, AlbatrossX3, Nina, Poizon and more.
My art was featured a couple of times on The Starcraft Observer, an awesome project hosted by Nish who is putting forward the artists of all disciplines making StarCraft content.
https://www.instagram.com/p/CThXxgrLJdy/
In October 2021, I was invited as a guest on the Pylon show to talk about my artwork. I’m so honored with this opportunity to share my passion with such a big audience. Here is the link to the show: https://youtu.be/zWWQJ7j3hOk
I had an interview in french with Necro, who is hosting the Gateway podcast; a one on one gaming podcast where we get to know the various members of the Canadian Starcraft community and their personal journey with the game.
Here is the link to the interview: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=koBA7OnTk7A
This shop and my twitch channel represent my only income to support my family. Your support for my art is greatly appreciated and helps me immensely. I’ve invested a lot of money in this project, art and shipping supplies are really expensive. I truly hope that I will succeed in being profitable and sustainable. It's my big dream to live from my art and my streams!
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