My works are visual puzzles that attempt to explain myself and how I interact with the people and world around me. They use images that create metaphors and are collaged together to create a more complex scenario. These images are pulled from popular culture, nature, or my personal past. Often, the juxtaposition of the images creates a humorous, and sometimes absurd, composition.
For the past few years I have been working with pre-made ceramic objects, such as bricks, tiles, and plates. Many of these were broken, or I have purposely broken them. There is a sense of catharsis in both fixing and breaking a piece; that fixing a piece is like fixing myself, and that breaking a piece is like letting go of something from my past. The surface is worked and reworked, fired and re-fired. This is to to create more layers and depth in my work. I am drawn to the surface and possibilities of ceramics, but I have also started to use non-ceramic techniques on it as well, such as gold leaf guilding.
My current series of work, “The Vacuum Between Us”, consists of broken, hand-painted plates mounted on blue-flocked, wooden boxes. Each plate has a vaguely decipherable portrait on it, each is someone that I have known. They bring to question: what happens to the people who are no longer part of our present, but of our past? Do we forgive them for what they did wrong? Can we forgive ourselves for what we did wrong?
For the past few years I have been working with pre-made ceramic objects, such as bricks, tiles, and plates. Many of these were broken, or I have purposely broken them. There is a sense of catharsis in both fixing and breaking a piece; that fixing a piece is like fixing myself, and that breaking a piece is like letting go of something from my past. The surface is worked and reworked, fired and re-fired. This is to to create more layers and depth in my work. I am drawn to the surface and possibilities of ceramics, but I have also started to use non-ceramic techniques on it as well, such as gold leaf guilding.
My current series of work, “The Vacuum Between Us”, consists of broken, hand-painted plates mounted on blue-flocked, wooden boxes. Each plate has a vaguely decipherable portrait on it, each is someone that I have known. They bring to question: what happens to the people who are no longer part of our present, but of our past? Do we forgive them for what they did wrong? Can we forgive ourselves for what we did wrong?