ARTIST STATEMENT

“ACCUMULATE implies unintentional gathering of items, while to COLLECT implies to gather with a purpose”

From birth we collect/accumulate and layer on the things that make up our “self”, some innate and some picked consciously or unconsciously by way of conditioning. Our identity is like a fragile membrane surrounding us, that is continuously being altered by our backgrounds/circumstances and choices. This membrane is continuously morphing, 

Its state affects how we perceive and react to the world. When our membrane is tight, absolute we become reflexive, cynical, holes in our membrane shift to only allow more of the same through. When the membrane is flimsy and overinflated, we become guarded, reactionary, when the membrane is porous we allow a two way seep, we try to dissolve, widen and just BE, when the membrane is tender, we get kinder on both its sides, inwardly and outwardly. We are rarely objective and we almost always lazily look through a preset cloudy framework.

So I create figures with an opaque and strong core, surrounded by fuzzy membranes/outfits like cells with their nucleus and membrane. These figures are usually in symbolic acts of collection, spilling, interacting, undressing, letting go, cultivating… 

My process is layering, making parts heavy or blurry, having backgrounds eat into the figures and viceversa, porous stippling, having each layer subtly affect the next. it is almost impossible to isolate any single layer, they all fuse into one fuzzy form. Leaving me with pieces that have almost gone through the same processes of collection/leaks as I have.