Artist's statement

Pop culture has always captured my imagination and influenced my artwork. I am fascinated by the way it is articulated through mixed media, whether it be in a tabloid, a music video, an action figure, fashion or film. My goal as an artist is to translate these social statements, both the mundane and extraordinary into an artistic vehicle.

My work aims to elicit a strong reaction from its’ viewer. The characters and landscapes I present here provide an over-the-top, exaggerated aesthetic that pushes the boundaries of what people expect and challenge their traditional ideas of portrait and landscape painting. Particularly with my female subjects, I'm trying to push the envelope and to be offensive in a way that provokes my audience to think about if and why a piece is problematic, or perhaps why it is not cohesive to prevailing social standards.

I have long been captivated by the powerful, feminine images presented in zaftig idol of ancient cultures, the pages of the Playboy Magazine or the Barbie Dolls my sister played with as a child. I love the generous curves, large, shimmering red lips, and over flowing bodice of the glamorous female figures, and this aesthetic carries over to my work with portraits and pinups. By using the traditional female archetype in art, characterized by exaggerated features of the female form (breast, eyes, cheek bones, chins, lips) I'm exploring and interpreting an ideology that challenges conventional norms of portraiture or figure drawing, while maintaining a thread of humor and irony in my work. Many of my pieces demonstrate the synthetic, surgically enhanced, plastic like qualities of what we expect as beauty in today’s fashion and pornography industries, as though the woman I’m depicting have a few coats of wax polish over their bodies. I also create pieces that exploit imperfections and deformities, which I think are even more important to the viewing experience. I believe it is these different interpretations of female beauty that I am able to incorporate unique details and visual anomalies that create an unforgettable piece.

Studying Fine Art at the University of Vermont allowed me to experiment with many mediums and various artistic genres. I found painting or drawing still life or traditional subjects limiting; I enjoy the freedom that my own imagination provides me. Nothing is off limits when an image from my imagination is interpreted onto paper or canvas. I certainly use still life and models to put several of my characters or landscapes into the context of ‘real life’ in order to challenge what may be expected or is traditional. For example, I may use a model to draw a specific dance pose; the position of the hands, the spry movements of the fingers, the arch of the neck and tilt of the head. By using unique color combinations, and thoughtful brush strokes, I'm able to create the illusion of light and shadow, form and figure. I am interested not only in the liberty that abstract art affords the artist but in the interpretative independence it lends to audiences.

Much of my artwork evolves out of finished pieces. One of the most fulfilling aspects of my work is reworking the product. Long after completion, it's a thrill to come back and discover new parts of the image I didn't see before. Time and distance from a piece, and subsequent experiences, help me acquire fresh insight.

My work demonstrates a strong emphasis on line. As drawing was the first medium I worked in, my use of pen and ink has become quite sophisticated, and I'm able to manipulate line to add the intricate, intimate details that shape the wild, exaggerate style I embrace. However, gouache, oil and acrylic painting are recent progressions in my work. I find that the use of paint lets me drive the boundaries of color and line, which are achieved differently with pen and ink.