Artist Statement

I make out of curiosity: a radical exploration of possibility in the present moment. What can I do?

Making requires alternative ways of seeing. Painting pieces together shapes. Block printing establishes negative and positive space. Bookmaking requires deep consideration of the parts of an “everyday” object - something typically looked at as a whole. Bandanas require an eye for design for different use cases (see: folds). All of these materials, shapes, lines, colors, and forms have been here all along. Art refocuses. Art queers.

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I make as a celebration of myself.

I spent many years not making, spending my energy as decreed by the status quo (having a “career” which never included making art as I wasn’t “good enough”). This creative spark has been present from the beignning…just dormant; a prolonged overwintering due to perfectionism and Capitalism. The seeds were there, though, biding their time…resting..absorbing the nutrients that allowed this part of me to grow and unfurl.

I make things that bring me joy. Spending time with these subjects that are otherwise “unimportant” is honoring my weird little soul. Not what I “should” be making or liking, what I like. What I love and often have loved for a long time. My inner child is escatic. I’m glad to give them a chance to be that.

Its an incendental bonus that others find joy in my work. I know how magical it feels to be seen by someone else’s creation…to see something out in the wild of the world made by someone else that makes my brain light up and go YES. What a gift to have a hand in that expeirence for someone!

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Making is exposure therapy to uncertainty.

Every step of the process can go “wrong.” I’m incapable of wasting materials on principle so very little is discarded. I’ve created some of my favorite pieces based off a whim of an idea from a scrap. As a perfectionist with an anxiety disorder - this is a big deal. Making builds trust in myself, honoring a strong intuition that has always been present but often muted.