Statement

My work blends fragments of unwanted things into fantastical sculptures that connect to histories, memories, and our innate desires for connection and protection.

The work emerges from a swirling soup of familiar textures and material contradictions that many of us encounter and subconsciously integrate throughout our day: synthetic and organic, antique and mass-produced, shiny and dull, precious and disposable, plush and jagged. Sourced from curbside "free" piles, thrift stores, or from bags of random stuff foisted from a friend's decluttering, once-meaningful, but no longer sentimental, things become my jumping off point. Holiday ornaments, china sets, stuffed animals, handmade afghans and sweaters are “rescued”, but deconstructed, before they are grafted and entwined with discretely functional things like toothpicks, buttons, sponges, window screens.

Often, I intuitively converge these found and modified objects into both vibrant maximalist sculptures that are vibrant, dense, and teeming with alien life. Processes of wrapping and stitching, as well as embracing and smothering, recur throughout the work, evoking both bandage and burden, and healing and restraint.

Some resemble fantastical versions of botanical ecosystems and others are reminiscent of microscopic toxins we unknowingly breathe. Like many ideologies we absorb and inherit— they are often unseen, or acknowledged, yet shape us and help determine our outcome all the same.

At times, sculptural forms incorporate furniture and domestic architectural fragments, to make hybrid structures that resemble watchtowers, altars, or makeshift shrines. These constructions suggest the quiet but persistent power dynamics embedded in domestic space and cultural memory as well as point to the home as a formative, and sacred, place.