Visual Diary Series (Manifestations of Chronic Pain) 2023-present
What animal would you choose to represent chronic pain?
Can we make friends with our pain?
How do we cope with the loss of a functioning body? Through a lens of exaggeration and humor, these portraits explore the idea of disability, deformity, loss of mobility and sight, chronic pain, and ultimately acceptance.
Utilizing recurring motifs of animals, demons and eyes, all self-declared symbols of chronic pain, this disassociation and anthropomorphizing opens the space for a relationship to form between the self and pain. These compartmentalized relationships are depicted in a fantastical yet approachable way, often alluding to the different stages of grief. In this built environment fears can be explored, while even coming to a place of appreciation for living with a broken body.
Relying on caricature, humor, and distortion as coping mechanisms to allow space for this mourning process, healing can occur. In addition, making room for others to connect to the metaphors of pain through the visceral imagery and accessible subject matter, opens up dialog about mental health, and provides validation and visibility to others who struggle with chronic pain or degenerative diseases.
Utilizing recurring motifs of animals, demons and eyes, all self-declared symbols of chronic pain, this disassociation and anthropomorphizing opens the space for a relationship to form between the self and pain. These compartmentalized relationships are depicted in a fantastical yet approachable way, often alluding to the different stages of grief. In this built environment fears can be explored, while even coming to a place of appreciation for living with a broken body.
Relying on caricature, humor, and distortion as coping mechanisms to allow space for this mourning process, healing can occur. In addition, making room for others to connect to the metaphors of pain through the visceral imagery and accessible subject matter, opens up dialog about mental health, and provides validation and visibility to others who struggle with chronic pain or degenerative diseases.
Taming the Titties series 2023-present
When I was in high school a friend asked me if there was anything I would change about my body. Without hesitation I said “I’d cut off my boobs!”
Since a young age I have had a love/hate relationship with my breasts. This body of work explores my relationship with this iconic body part that is synonymous with feminine beauty, yet has been a lifelong annoyance. They sweat, they itch, they ache, they bounce, they dangle, they swell, yet they have also fed my children and been the object of wanted desire. They can become diseased and kill their women, while also being fetishized and coveted. People add fake ones to their bodies and some people remove them completely. These disembodied portraits explore my relationship with these infamous flaps of flesh.
Since a young age I have had a love/hate relationship with my breasts. This body of work explores my relationship with this iconic body part that is synonymous with feminine beauty, yet has been a lifelong annoyance. They sweat, they itch, they ache, they bounce, they dangle, they swell, yet they have also fed my children and been the object of wanted desire. They can become diseased and kill their women, while also being fetishized and coveted. People add fake ones to their bodies and some people remove them completely. These disembodied portraits explore my relationship with these infamous flaps of flesh.
