Statement

The human body and our collective stories, lived and imagined, have remained a continued source of inspiration for my practice. In my most recent series, biomorphic shapes emerge in highly saturated color devoid of their original narratives. Making them, I think about aliens, body parts, and fringe characters happily living outside societal norms. My work is heavily influenced by cinema and low culture. It is also inspired by the genres of figure painting and early abstraction; as well as fantastical and outlandish sets and films from artists like John Waters, David Lynch, Sofia Coppola, and sets and performances from opera and drag. 

The small and medium-sized canvases are completed once they are by nailed to wood panels, turning them into objects. The larger paintings are stretched. I use rich, bright hues in oil and acrylic paint such as Cadmium Orange, Naphthol Red, and Quinacridone Opera —a pink that has the subtlety of a Liberace pantsuit. Some of these works are completed in a day, while others are made over a longer period of time. Occasionally, I use cold wax medium for the smaller oil paintings along with collage elements from previous canvases, glitter paper, and photos. Upon the start of the process in each of these instances raw canvas, much like a skin, is pinned directly to the studio wall.

My practice is rooted in the lore of Frankenstein. The ground is an amorous flesh attracting the female gaze (in many cases my own), deconstruction, reconstruction, desire, and pleasure. My experience of growing up in a closed social structure where the “norm” was enforced with vigor and was anything but normal has led me to question societal norms and structures. I do this in many ways and one is through the stories I tell in my artwork. To do this, I embrace the absurd, the oddity, the labeled underdog. In the ways that running away with the circus provides the doorway to finding one’s tribe as a self-proclaimed weirdo, I revel in creating a circus for myself and others to commune with in my paintings. I do this using color, imagined characters, and implementing abstraction that straddles recognized forms as a vehicle.

My paintings of still lifes and interiors depict the day-to-day petri dish that home became during quarantine and comfort foods that have provided solace while recently living in unfamiliar places. Since 2014, I have been photographing and painting the interiors of hotel rooms, these comforting spaces devoid of personal memory. Inside my hotel rooms, I have made quick diary-like self-portraits and still lifes from things like bibles found in dressers and towel racks in the bathroom.