BODY SERIES ARTIST STATEMENT:
My work utilizes the body as a vehicle for stories. I’m using images of wounds and injury as a language to talk about human resilience. They function as evidence of how we process trauma and how we recover from it. The work is abstract, and can shift from being atmospheric to a magnified perspective of the body. I want viewers to be able to apply their own stories to the pieces, which are intimate in nature. By investigating this imagery, I play with its’ potential to exist as something beautiful, even cathartic.
The bruise series is my first and longest developing idea. A bruise is a potent image- a cycle of injury and recovery. The impact, contusion, and healing stages are all part of an evolutionary timeline. They are a record of how we process and heal from different forms of pain, not just in the physical sense. For the most part I have chosen to create these in a predominantly large and vertical scale, mimicking the silhouette of viewer’s body confronted by the work.
For the scar series, the material is heavily tied to its’ meaning- the act of stitching can be seen as an act of mending or repairing, functioning the way a scar does for the body. Stitching is also associated with delicate, decorative, and beautiful things. I am repurposing its’ function using it as a drawing tool for a mark on the body that people tend to want to conceal or minimize.
The specimen series is a newer developing idea. The imagery refers to something that is infectious or contagious, drawing inspiration from photos of bacteria or specimen slides. They are anthropomorphic and nonspecific. They also stem from looking at skin up close. Skin is the largest organ of the body, yet it is often interpreted as fragile- vulnerable to both injuries and aging. The glass frames these pieces are displayed in function as oversized versions of lab slides. Some of them are displayed in actual lab slide format- small in scale requiring close examination to catch the detail.