Artist's Statement
By allowing flexibility of interpretation, visual art breaks down cultural and educational boundaries presented in other forms of communication. Each person capable of experiencing the artwork is able to create personal meaning from the viewing experience. My work aims to solicit this individual exploration rather than dictate dogmatic conclusions.
Travel has taught me much, not only of life in a new environment, but also of myself and the place and culture I have come from. In transitioning from life in a rural, ethnically homogenous region of the Northwest United States to a multicultural, urban locality of the Pacific, I became more aware of obvious racial stereotyping, gendered interaction, and anonymity among crowds. Where social interactions conscribed to values contradicting my own, I began reevaluating my principles. As a result, I discovered major junctures between the altruistic, ethical ideologies proclaimed by political, religious, and parental figures and the actions carried out by members and organizations of our society. The unprecedented individual freedoms we enjoy as Americans has also contributed to an unprecedented alienation and dehumanization among our people by lowering our needs for personal cooperation, demonstrating the might of commercialism, and transforming individuals into commodities. After investigating the meaning of such sociological paradoxes, the focus of my artwork dramatically shifted from portraying personal narratives to examining the broader, social and circumstantial conditions of my existence as a middle class, white female living in the United States.
In my artwork, much of my cynicism is relieved through the use of humor, irony, metaphor, and narration. While the focus of my work revolves around various social phenomena I face in day-to-day life, it almost always is colored by an overarching focus on gender and sexuality. I primarily utilize print and photographic media in combination with alternative methods of physical reconstruction and assemblage to index various forms from everyday life. The ability of these media to encompass both primary image creation and found image appropriation allows me to recontextualize the meanings of recognizable elements and forms, shifting their normatively established, culturally implied meanings to created new lines of questioning and understanding.
