The figures in my work exist somewhere between my body, storied ingénues, and iconic nudes: idyllic Fauves, toned Greco-Roman sculptures, languid Odalisques, and preposterously proportioned Pin-Ups. My contention with “the reclining nude” and “the bather" is the appeal of her lethargy, moreover, her performance of relaxation and distress versus the reality. Reinterpreting and repeating iterations of this figure is emblematic of my complicated relationship to western culture and media: over-saturated by my close-but-never-close-enough likeness to pitied, yet desired, women in paintings, myths, fairy tales, films and advertisements. Born and raised in Los Angeles, my surroundings were inundated with this visual language in billboards, television, murals and museums. I am curious as to the effects of that overexposure, and how this tradition of the female figure as passive, yet central, has shaped my expectations of art, femininity, self-care, and sexuality.

 

Painting, printmaking and drawing are the central focus of my practice, though I occasionally explore an expanded definition of these mediums into mixed-media sculpture, animation and collage. Using layers of high contrast colors and bold line work, I illustrate vignettes of unease and yearning. Recurring melancholic props and scenery such as tissue boxes, fires, animals, and spilling messes of wax, blood, tears and fruit further inform my narratives. Both the imagery and the act of painting, printmaking or drawing, the method and ritual of it, imbue metaphorical and thematic significance to the work. I reveal aspects of the process in my work to give it a sense of duration while remaining in a fixed state or a loop. The innate stillness speaks to the fatigue of feeling overwhelmed and the problems of inertia in times that desperately call for action.