STATEMENT OF WORK

I make art as a way to think through concepts including point of view, orientation, transparency, and reproduction, with particular attention to various modes of language (speech, writing, translation, and gesture). My interest in orientation is rooted in my upbringing: I grew up with an identical twin sister and a brother who became schizophrenic, so I originally used art making as a tool to reach self-awareness—and for reorientation in a family dynamic in which my sense of self was often doubled, questioned, or distorted. 

Being a twin has meant that I’m a “we” before I’m an “I,” and this social-mindedness has become the template with which I tend to work. For example, the starting points for two series of paintings and fabric pieces has been documentation of TVs in public spaces such as restaurants, bodegas, airports, hospitals, and laundromats (2013-2016); and a set of photographs cataloguing motorcycle covers outside homes in Brooklyn and Manhattan (2018-2019). I find that, in their ubiquitous and persistent way, these objects and their specific placements in public settings illuminate human choice and difference.

Growing up in proximity to my brother’s developing psychosis gave me insight into as well as compassion for the range and malleability of human perception, something I continue to investigate. Early on I witnessed the slippage between language and image as either facilitators or obstacles to connection with others, as well as the necessity of a continual calibration between sensory input and output. I play with this slippage between obfuscation and conveyance, sensory overload and balance, in my work. 

Over time, my art making has evolved from serving as a vehicle to reach clarity of self into a way of life through which I hope to see others clearly. In 2022 I earned a master's degree in clinical social work and psychotherapy. I view my art practice and my psychotherapy practice as complementary.