STATEMENT OF WORK

My work honors the histories of trauma and resilient narratives of my close female relatives. Through physical and psychological acts of construction and repair-- stitching, collage, print and transfer-- their stories materialize gendered experiences of loss and hope. My study of art historical representations of female deference, sexualization and violation, influences my process; I strive to create images of women that express their full humanity and are beautiful on their own complicated terms.

              I create and accumulate fragments of painted paper, which become a lexicon of mark and color to use as units of collage.  I respond to the folds and irregularities of my substrate, embedding within them a framework of charcoal line, to adorn and alter with scraps of painted paper, monotypes, and acrylic transfer. The collage process is evocative of partially understood experience and the fragmented quality of memory, while the layers of painted translucent paper reference both the body and the formal language of painting. The layers accrue like skin, constructing or obscuring form, or are ripped away, leaving only a trace of harm. In rebuilding the image, the painted paper functions as a poultice or bandage. Through these acts of patching and decoupage, practices associated with woman’s domestic labor and craft, I pursue collage as a female act of repair and re-envisioning.

            I often use kitchen towels and other found domestic textiles as substrates to explore the resistance inherent in making do, which connects to female traditions of innovation. Each comes with a history—stains, tears, burns, bleach marks—which informs my alterations. Alluding to illness, failure, aspiration, and fantasy, my interventions combine with the existing traits to locate and magnify the narrative of my female protagonists.