ARTIST STATEMENT
My work depicts my interest in the human form and issues related to race, sex and gender. I am fascinated and intrigued by these issues and use my paintings to reveal my personal experiences and responses. Through surrendered thoughts and intuition, I am offered space to create and relive past experiences of isolation, discrimination and rejection due to my race and sexuality. Remembering my desires to play with dolls and attraction to other “girly” things produced very unsettling feelings during my childhood. Today, I frequently revisit those memories and summons them to serve as a resource and inspiration for my paintings. This work is cathartic and emotionally challenging for me. It is my hope that my work “strikes a cord” with those who share similar life experiences and to those that don’t.
My expressive, loosely composed acrylic paintings permit the forms to move throughout the canvas, presenting multiple dimensions of shared time and space. The bright and whimsical color palettes juxtapose against the loose, informal composition, convey a time innocence and playfulness but without preparation or a warning, leads the viewer to a place of distance, isolation and uneasiness.
As a devout practitioner of Buddhism, I frequently inject these ideologies into my work. Believing that we chose “everything” in life… our health, parents, finances, gifts, race, orientation, disabilities, etc., and also believing that we have the ability to eradicate negative life conditions, is a very powerful and liberating state of being. There is a very strong connection between the self and the environment that I explore and want to present in my work.
This body is not "I". This body is just like our clothing. When finished with it, we will discard it and choose another, like putting on a new set of clothing.
Heart of a Buddha, 2001
My work depicts my interest in the human form and issues related to race, sex and gender. I am fascinated and intrigued by these issues and use my paintings to reveal my personal experiences and responses. Through surrendered thoughts and intuition, I am offered space to create and relive past experiences of isolation, discrimination and rejection due to my race and sexuality. Remembering my desires to play with dolls and attraction to other “girly” things produced very unsettling feelings during my childhood. Today, I frequently revisit those memories and summons them to serve as a resource and inspiration for my paintings. This work is cathartic and emotionally challenging for me. It is my hope that my work “strikes a cord” with those who share similar life experiences and to those that don’t.
My expressive, loosely composed acrylic paintings permit the forms to move throughout the canvas, presenting multiple dimensions of shared time and space. The bright and whimsical color palettes juxtapose against the loose, informal composition, convey a time innocence and playfulness but without preparation or a warning, leads the viewer to a place of distance, isolation and uneasiness.
As a devout practitioner of Buddhism, I frequently inject these ideologies into my work. Believing that we chose “everything” in life… our health, parents, finances, gifts, race, orientation, disabilities, etc., and also believing that we have the ability to eradicate negative life conditions, is a very powerful and liberating state of being. There is a very strong connection between the self and the environment that I explore and want to present in my work.
This body is not "I". This body is just like our clothing. When finished with it, we will discard it and choose another, like putting on a new set of clothing.
Heart of a Buddha, 2001
