ARTIST STATEMENT

PAINTING/ DRAWING

In my dreams I have ripped my chest open, peeled off layers of skin and dug holes in my arms in an attempt to remove hosts that were living inside of me. I have struggled to breathe underwater, smelled the sweat of others, vomited all my teeth out of my mouth and grown a large rat-tail out of my spine. I have chased piglets in an attempt to rip bacon off their backs and I have repeatedly failed to save the life of a dying animal. I have seen the back of myself and a group of people stand in shrimp infested water up to our knees, only to come to the realization that it was all taking place inside my anus.

My paintings, drawings and sculptures are informed by my dreams and they document the lives of women; our appearance, how we are perceived, our personal struggles and our strengths. Through my viewpoints on voyeurism, life, death, beauty and transformation, the women in my works embrace their outward sexuality, their curiosity, their confidence and personal power. I am not interested in who we are underneath our clothes, but rather who we are underneath our skin. The voyeuristic qualities in the paintings are beyond anonymously witnessing nudity without anyone's knowledge. It is not about a person stealing an image of you, but rather stealing the deepest sense of self; call it your spirit, soul or humanity. The act of spying on someone undressing is a betrayal, but stealing a psychological personal moment, one in which you are vulnerable, helpless and emotionally exposed is something that disturbs me even more.

By peeking through holes in my sculptures and discovering a woman squeezing a rainbow out of another figure's breast; by opening the doors of a multi-paneled painting and revealing a woman resting her foot inside another woman's anus; by opening a book with the image of a woman covered in hands and realizing that your own hands are participating in the dismemberment of her body, I seek to create an intimate relationship with the viewer. In a world in which one is constantly finding distraction from feeling emotions, I want to make the viewer feel something. I want the viewer to be able to discover and identify something new about themselves through this exchange and ultimately, by the experience of real emotion through human presence, to make them feel more alive.

COLLAGE

Like the paintings and drawings the collages are extremely personal, they adhere to the same rules of divisions and layering, but offer a different perspective. I can recall where I have found every piece of paper and I hide information within them. I prefer to use worn papers, which have been stepped on or damaged in any other way, it shows that they already had a history by the time I found them. They become locked diaries, in which they leave the viewer to appreciate the formal values and wonder about the undisclosed information inside. The letter collages turn literal words into shapes of color, and specific palettes and structures arrive in each letter. Each letter is aimed at a very specific being. Just like any letter, I think about what I want to say and who I am saying it to. I create a psychological portrait in which I explore a personal dialogue and the feelings a specific subject generates within me.