Artist Statement
My work relates to spectacle and American politics. It utilizes classical painting and drawing technique but considers the space of installation and viewer interaction.
I sometimes use curved mirrors in a technique called anamorphosis. I like the history and metaphor of this technique, and also the way in which it involves the viewer physically in the process. Anamorphosis, which means “to form again,” is a technique with roots in Renaissance linear perspective, Victorian children’s novelties, and concealment of pornography. It has been used by contemporary artists, including William Kentridge, Jonty Hurwitz, and Istvan Orosz. I am interested in this format because it is an old technique which seems to be in dialogue with current ideas. It is a form of intermedia and interactive installation. It is a literalization of an attempt to change the dominant point of view. The process of distorting reality, then rebuilding some semblance of it which appears tangible but is actually a fleeting image seen as a reflection is, in my mind, a visual manifestation of some of the critical theory writing of Jacques Lacan, Jean Baudrillard, and Guy Debord.
I also paint. When I paint I think about metaphorical composition: from whose perspective are we viewing the picture? I am interested in the history of the gaze and the double portrait, how gazes and perspective lines convey power relationships. Sometimes I use abstraction and realist elements together in a composition. Everything I put into a picture carries the weight of its history. When I insert an abstract expressionist gesture, I am thinking about the 1940s nationalist machismo of Pollock, Rothko, and Newman. I use Baroque contrast, quoting Velasquez, Goya, Manet.
Scale is important to me. My paintings are medium to large, on human scale. The anamorphic drawings are small because they are like little intimate, magical objects.
Flag Paintings
These paintings reconfigure the American flag using class III reflective material, which is required PPE for all work done on the streets, such as construction and public works. I am a female artist who works full-time in a public service field typically dominated by conservative, working class males. I was using mirrors in my work as a metaphorical material, exploring ideas of distortion and reflection. When I started working in a position requiring these reflective uniforms and reporting to work before dawn, the mirror-like glow of this material in the dark of morning, along with the connection to the people who wear it, inspired me to begin sewing with it. The act of cutting, hand-sewing, and painting the American flag, and then sewing again with a mirror-like representation of the working-class, is meant as both iconoclasm of the symbol for a nation in crisis and redemption, beautification, and insertion of feminist power into a symbol of contention.
Many of the pieces utilize gunpowder, which I set on fire. This technique was taken from Cai Guo Xiang, but the idea of actually doing it was inspired by two drawing students at the four-room schoolhouse that is Chemeketa Community College Dallas campus. The repetition of stripes, to me, alludes to prison bars. I was thinking of Peter Halley's "Cells" here. I wanted to make art that addresses the issue of the ever-expanding American prison-industrial complex, while keeping it abstract and interwoven with the other ideas.
July and Everything After (Quilts)
I like black comedy and satire. My work can be dark, but there has to be humor and beauty in it.
This body of work is about experiencing right-wing conservative culture through the eyes of a liberal iconoclast. I lived in Salem, Oregon for 5 years. I think of Salem as “Every City.” In my imagination, it is a representation of a typical mid-sized American city – an interstate running through, a couple of Walmarts, not much to do other than “watch the game.” Salem even has a name that could place it in any state. Guns, drugs and hopelessness are rampant in Every City. That is a thread that runs through a lot of this work.
I started using Class III reflective material (visibility safety material worn by construction workers), cut-up flags, and gunpowder in 2020, while living in Salem. The material evolved to include Kevlar (bullet-proof vest material) and used jeans and T-shirts when supply-chain shortages affected the materials I was previously using.
During the COVID shutdown, while white-collar workers were “sheltering in place” and reinventing the concept of a business meeting using Zoom, blue-collar workers, which comprise the majority in Every City, were out there working every day. My soon-to-be ex-husband, Ray, was driving a crane truck 70 hours a week to Redmond or Prineville most days to put roofs on fancy new suburban homes. Apparently this was considered essential work due to a housing shortage, yet we were simultaneously seeing an increase in houseless people who obviously could not afford these homes. My job, City Parks maintenance, also picked up during the pandemic due to the housing shortage. Salem City Council moved all the homeless into the parks. That was the strategy to mitigate the hazard of COVID on downtown streets. Out of sight, out of mind. Suddenly, the Parks department became responsible for dealing with the homeless epidemic.
Then came the wildfires that burned through most of the towns along the Santiam River, which led to a further increase in the homeless population in Salem – families that lost their homes in the fires and didn’t have the reserves to start over. And the smoke. Unbreathable air quality. Portland made national news, but the air quality was worse in Salem. This is Every City, those forgotten places along America’s highways, in the shadows of their neighboring, more glamorous cities.
In 2021, when an ice storm dropped trees all over the streets and power lines, I was out there helping get the roads clear and going home to a cold, dark house every night. Ray was dragging downed trees from the end of the block, chained to his old farm truck, dropping them in front of the house and creating a neighborhood spectacle, slabbing them with his Alaskan chainsaw mill. Not the typical scene on a city street. At the time of his death, just a year and a half later, there was several thousand pounds of milled wood on his property.
Using working class clothing – I started with Class III reflective material and moved on to jeans and used T-shirts – is not a new idea. The quilters of Gee’s Bend, and others going way back to the pioneer days, used the art of quilting as a form of recycling – making do with what you have and killing time, creating a product that protects and provides warmth.
July and Everything After refers to the time period in which these quilts were created – beginning in July of 2021 when I moved out of Salem and began reflecting on the experience, and culminating in July of 2022 with Ray’s untimely death at age 44, in his Salem home.
My work relates to spectacle and American politics. It utilizes classical painting and drawing technique but considers the space of installation and viewer interaction.
I sometimes use curved mirrors in a technique called anamorphosis. I like the history and metaphor of this technique, and also the way in which it involves the viewer physically in the process. Anamorphosis, which means “to form again,” is a technique with roots in Renaissance linear perspective, Victorian children’s novelties, and concealment of pornography. It has been used by contemporary artists, including William Kentridge, Jonty Hurwitz, and Istvan Orosz. I am interested in this format because it is an old technique which seems to be in dialogue with current ideas. It is a form of intermedia and interactive installation. It is a literalization of an attempt to change the dominant point of view. The process of distorting reality, then rebuilding some semblance of it which appears tangible but is actually a fleeting image seen as a reflection is, in my mind, a visual manifestation of some of the critical theory writing of Jacques Lacan, Jean Baudrillard, and Guy Debord.
I also paint. When I paint I think about metaphorical composition: from whose perspective are we viewing the picture? I am interested in the history of the gaze and the double portrait, how gazes and perspective lines convey power relationships. Sometimes I use abstraction and realist elements together in a composition. Everything I put into a picture carries the weight of its history. When I insert an abstract expressionist gesture, I am thinking about the 1940s nationalist machismo of Pollock, Rothko, and Newman. I use Baroque contrast, quoting Velasquez, Goya, Manet.
Scale is important to me. My paintings are medium to large, on human scale. The anamorphic drawings are small because they are like little intimate, magical objects.
Flag Paintings
These paintings reconfigure the American flag using class III reflective material, which is required PPE for all work done on the streets, such as construction and public works. I am a female artist who works full-time in a public service field typically dominated by conservative, working class males. I was using mirrors in my work as a metaphorical material, exploring ideas of distortion and reflection. When I started working in a position requiring these reflective uniforms and reporting to work before dawn, the mirror-like glow of this material in the dark of morning, along with the connection to the people who wear it, inspired me to begin sewing with it. The act of cutting, hand-sewing, and painting the American flag, and then sewing again with a mirror-like representation of the working-class, is meant as both iconoclasm of the symbol for a nation in crisis and redemption, beautification, and insertion of feminist power into a symbol of contention.
Many of the pieces utilize gunpowder, which I set on fire. This technique was taken from Cai Guo Xiang, but the idea of actually doing it was inspired by two drawing students at the four-room schoolhouse that is Chemeketa Community College Dallas campus. The repetition of stripes, to me, alludes to prison bars. I was thinking of Peter Halley's "Cells" here. I wanted to make art that addresses the issue of the ever-expanding American prison-industrial complex, while keeping it abstract and interwoven with the other ideas.
July and Everything After (Quilts)
I like black comedy and satire. My work can be dark, but there has to be humor and beauty in it.
This body of work is about experiencing right-wing conservative culture through the eyes of a liberal iconoclast. I lived in Salem, Oregon for 5 years. I think of Salem as “Every City.” In my imagination, it is a representation of a typical mid-sized American city – an interstate running through, a couple of Walmarts, not much to do other than “watch the game.” Salem even has a name that could place it in any state. Guns, drugs and hopelessness are rampant in Every City. That is a thread that runs through a lot of this work.
I started using Class III reflective material (visibility safety material worn by construction workers), cut-up flags, and gunpowder in 2020, while living in Salem. The material evolved to include Kevlar (bullet-proof vest material) and used jeans and T-shirts when supply-chain shortages affected the materials I was previously using.
During the COVID shutdown, while white-collar workers were “sheltering in place” and reinventing the concept of a business meeting using Zoom, blue-collar workers, which comprise the majority in Every City, were out there working every day. My soon-to-be ex-husband, Ray, was driving a crane truck 70 hours a week to Redmond or Prineville most days to put roofs on fancy new suburban homes. Apparently this was considered essential work due to a housing shortage, yet we were simultaneously seeing an increase in houseless people who obviously could not afford these homes. My job, City Parks maintenance, also picked up during the pandemic due to the housing shortage. Salem City Council moved all the homeless into the parks. That was the strategy to mitigate the hazard of COVID on downtown streets. Out of sight, out of mind. Suddenly, the Parks department became responsible for dealing with the homeless epidemic.
Then came the wildfires that burned through most of the towns along the Santiam River, which led to a further increase in the homeless population in Salem – families that lost their homes in the fires and didn’t have the reserves to start over. And the smoke. Unbreathable air quality. Portland made national news, but the air quality was worse in Salem. This is Every City, those forgotten places along America’s highways, in the shadows of their neighboring, more glamorous cities.
In 2021, when an ice storm dropped trees all over the streets and power lines, I was out there helping get the roads clear and going home to a cold, dark house every night. Ray was dragging downed trees from the end of the block, chained to his old farm truck, dropping them in front of the house and creating a neighborhood spectacle, slabbing them with his Alaskan chainsaw mill. Not the typical scene on a city street. At the time of his death, just a year and a half later, there was several thousand pounds of milled wood on his property.
Using working class clothing – I started with Class III reflective material and moved on to jeans and used T-shirts – is not a new idea. The quilters of Gee’s Bend, and others going way back to the pioneer days, used the art of quilting as a form of recycling – making do with what you have and killing time, creating a product that protects and provides warmth.
July and Everything After refers to the time period in which these quilts were created – beginning in July of 2021 when I moved out of Salem and began reflecting on the experience, and culminating in July of 2022 with Ray’s untimely death at age 44, in his Salem home.