Talia left her handprints and footprints on the world

     Talia Castellano was a YouTuber, a beauty guru, a Covergirl, a teenager, silly, and sincere. She was a young woman from Orlando, Florida who lived her life to the fullest and the utmost respectable extent. She also happened to have leukemia and neuroblastoma. Talia’s life was dedicated to creating beauty through makeup, her famous motto being, “Makeup is my wig”, as she did not wear a wig after her hair fell out from radiation therapy. This attached video item is a dedication to Talia Castellano’s life by her sister, Mattia Castellano, and what comes next in the lives of the Castellano family following Talia’s death on July 16, 2013 at the age of thirteen.

     Mattia created this video in order to comment on her little sister’s death to her YouTube fans. Mattia explains that Talia’s battle with her cancer was not lost, she in fact won and beat cancer albeit being taken too soon. Talia challenged ideas of conventional beauty through her use of makeup and used makeup to not only empower herself but also her many fans. She vlogged about her cancer and what she underwent, which juxtaposes both her illness and her passion to show that her ability to live regularly was not impaired by cancer. Mattia argues that her legacy will become everlasting as long as she continues to have fans who are inspired by her.

     The narrative created by both Castellano sisters relates back the collective memory of the “sick kid”. Like Camp John Marc and Sarah Hyland, the sisters challenge the narrative established by society and show that an illness does not make up your main identity. These influences teach people who struggle with illness that their illness is not who they are and that it can in fact be intersectional with the rest of who they are. The other parts of a person can influence their illness in hopefully positive ways.