SERIES BY CONCEPT
Although my work tends to flow organically from one concept to another, or result from the exploration of technique, there have been bodies of work united under a specific concept as a distinct series.
Anthropomorphosis
Inspired by Rosa Bonheur, using animal portraiture to express my connection to wildlife.
An exploration of animals who aesthetically alter their environments. It explores the age old question of what is art?
Healthy: the New Sexy
The affects of chronic (invisible) illness on sense of self, body image, and identity.
Anthropomorphosis
My father, a veterinarian and wildlife photographer, has often expressed that he feels more comfortable around animals than humans. I share this feeling, but also that I often feel more intellectually and emotionally stimulated by the animal world. When studying portraiture, I found myself struggling to stay connected. Inspired by Rosa Bonheur, I began inserting animals from my past into portraits. I focused on gaze, "hands," and posture to help viewers see the sentience of these beings to whom I feel such a connection.
The Birds and the Bees
Animal behavior has always fascinated me, and some of the most amazing displays of behavior (and of evolution) are driven by sexual selection and mating rituals. I traveled to the Galapagos islands to witness blue footed booby dances and marine iguana mating colors. In college, I was fascinated by the dances and transformations of birds of paradise and, following this line of curiosity, stumbled upon bowerbirds. Bowerbirds, like birds of paradise, live in parts of the world with abundant food and shelter, and few predators. Just as in humans, these conditions have given birds time and opportunity to develop traditions, cultures, education, and even art. These highly intelligent birds create enormous (originally thought to be man-made) structures called bowers, as part of their mating rituals. These bowers show complex architecture, sophisticated elements of design, color, and composition, and are not used for any function other than showing off for other bowerbirds. Young bowerbirds will often apprentice for several years under a master, honing skills, eye for color, and individual style. They learn how to create and use paintbrushes, dipped in bird-made pigments. They cultivate gardens, develop cultural fads, experiment and edit their work... scientists have been shocked by the levels of cognition and intent that bowerbirds display.
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The more I learned about bowerbirds and their displays, the more I wanted to understand if animals were in fact capable of creating art. I looked into other species that aesthetically alter their environments, such as potter wasps that encrust their pots with quarts for seemingly no functional reason and puffer fish in the Pacific who create massive intricate mandalas. There was certainly a spectrum of sentience, intelligence, and intention in these creations. If an animal created something purely for function, but it is seen to humans as beautiful, is it art? If an intelligent animal creates something beautiful for the sake of attraction, is it art? This body of work attempts to ask these questions and more, leaving the viewer to draw their own lines.
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The original installation was based on my obsession with science museum displays. Each animal was painted in a portrait and displayed with an artistic interpretation of their creations. There was also a table for information on each animal.
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(Phi Beta Kappa video about The Birds and the Bees)
Healthy: the New Sexy
My work was never autobiographical until recently, when my battle against chronic illness ached for an expressive outlet. I have been living with multiple genetic disorders for decades, but the last few years have been a sandstorm of worsened symptoms, specialists, diagnoses, and the ever-elusive treatments. Trying to maintain a normal life, job, relationships... have not been easy. I have had to reexamine my lifestyle, priorities, diet, and what it means to feel "healthy." The process has been life-changing and has helped me develop a distinct, if not always comfortable, image of who I am. It has certainly affected my mental health in intangible ways, but many of these phenomena have also manifested in very visual moments. Seeing myself hooked up to wires repeatedly. Seeing the deep purples under my eyes as I become malnourished and sleep-deprived. Seeing the vividness of my chemically-induced dreams. Seeing imaging of my heart, ovaries, spine and brain. Seeing medical tape and braces on my joints. Seeing my vertebrae separate, twist, and misalign. Seeing my ribs emerge as I lose weight, then seeing myself bulge and bloat as my body attempts to store foods it cannot digest. "Body image" has taken on new meaning as my body continues to visually represent my struggles and my battle to accept myself for who and what I'm able to be.
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This series was created out of a need to make sense of who I am, how I feel, and what I can be. Each piece was created in a moment of intense (and conflicting) emotions. It lays bare the vulnerability of being unwell in a society that values wellness.
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(Still in progress)
