My work stems from an emotional place of loss, grief, guilt, loneliness, and what I hope to ultimately be, understanding.
Materials act as a surrogate for my emotions. I struggle to express myself and my feelings, even to my closest friends, so I have found solace in using materials as a way to discover and rediscover things I am not yet ready to put into words. By reworking the same object in different forms, I am able to physically experience the psychological spinning of thoughts constantly running through my head.
It has been a natural progression from my upbringing to investigate bathing suits, non-slip rubber tiles, and swimming strokes. I use a process concerning the one-to-one translation. I use the term one-to-one translation because my works are not exact one-to-one copies or replicas, but are the result of a repetitive indexical process. I use methods of mold making and casting, printmaking, and mark making in order to transform the information embedded in the bathing suits, tiles, and strokes. I do not believe in inventing my own imagery, but discovering the imagery found in these objects through the process of one-to-one translations.
The physical and psychological suspension of the body while drowning is a specific point of fascination. I have been using materials and imagery that evoke what I imagine to be a lonely, agonizing, painful, but eventually, peaceful and quiet sensation. Much like how the tile is embedded in the concrete, and it appears there is a bathing suit trapped in the milky plaster, I am interested in how these objects embody the act of drowning, and the tranquil breaking point between the body and water. Dealing with loss has often felt like drowning, but in emotions, rather than waves.
I hope that by continuing to build my relationships with these objects and other materials in the future, I am in turn, able to make a philosophical enquiry that explores the nature of existence by emphasizing an experience of the human subject—not merely the thinking subject, but the acting, feeling, and living human individual. By shifting focus to the suit, my viewer is no longer in the position of the body but rather, looking at a representation of a body. My hope is that an audience will locate their own vulnerability within the work, and find a peaceful moment of contemplation within the ever bustling present.
