2025 Artist Statement

My artwork is about tumult, change, and how we come through it.

I’ve been in awe of energy dispersal for as long as I can remember. One of my earliest recollections of television was seeing a close up of a drop of water on a black background fall through the air hitting the surface of still water. I was captivated by the ring of droplets that rose from the water after the drop had disappeared under the surface and the way the circular waves of surface tension dispersed from the point of impact.

Growing up in the Pacific Northwest in the 80s and 90s, the echoes of the eruption of Mount St Helens - Lawetlat’la - lingered in the collective conscious. Despite the eruption having taken place a few years before my birth, it retained a weight and was recalled often. Hundreds of square miles were decimated, several people killed, and thousands of animals lost their lives as a result of the eruption. The area around the mountain had been covered in forest beforehand and, within less than a day, all of it was wiped away as a result of energy dispersal. Twenty one instances of eruptive activity took place within the following ten years after the eruption.

In the case of the water droplet, the surface eventually returns to a calm, still state. The only change is the addition of one water drop and the experience of the change. In the case of the eruption, the land was reformed, plants began to take root on a new surface of lava bed, and life began to return to the surrounds. There is growth and resilience.

Flowers have a visual expression of energy dispersal. The seed eventually cracks to let through leaves and petals that expand, reach outward, bloom, and eventually shrivel and recoil and become part of the soil again. In that time they contribute to their ecosystems in terms of pollination, reseeding, and soil health. They exemplify addition, fertility, and natural life cycles. Flowers are a constant reminder that life persists.

Paper is the medium I have chosen to express these organic materials. It is a pliable medium, often associated with frailty, but with the proper glue and construction methods, a paper sculpture can be strong. As time passes, the core structure of each piece will stay in place while the leaves, tendrils, and free standing elements will eventually droop. These slight shifts over time coincidentally reinforce this idea of inevitable change.

Many of my pieces are built on shapes and structures that reference volcanic explosions. The blooms depicted are a reminder that, if allowed, new experiences, new perceptions, new life can come from tumultuous moments in our lives.

The explosions in my work used to reference a lot of tumult I experienced in my earlier life. I often had a hard time expressing myself, especially when it came to strife. In recent years, the works have been a reminder that beautiful things have come about from great, overwhelming, confusing, shifts in life. After coming out on the other side of life-altering events, I learned of a resilience I never knew I had.

At the time of this writing, January 2025, we have just lived through one of the hottest years on record. Catastrophes are displacing people left and right. Wars continue to rage and people continue to discount one another when addressing conflict. It can be really hard to see the silver lining in what we as a collective do to one another.

I know that the world that we live in is a brutal one;—mainly a consequence of us humans having a hard time seeing each and every one of us as people living lives as varied, complex, and confusing as our own. I believe we tend to categorize things to an extent that can be detrimental, especially when grouping people and not seeing them in the same light we see our loved ones and ourselves. It is challenging to sonder when much of our day-to-day experience is tending to our own needs.

The fact remains that, at some point we all experience times of great tumult, loss and confusion, and that connects us. May these pieces serve as a reminder of resilience and beauty in the world in light of the changes we find ourselves experiencing whether of our own making or not.