ARTIST STATEMENT

I use embroidery, craft, sculpture, and poetry to confront generational legacies of violence – and healing. My practice weaves together research on whiteness, the histories of racial violence, and gender based violence with personal and family histories of abuse and my own emotional landscape. Seeking to personalize this history and confront the ways systemic violence manifests in our lives today, my work is intimate and historically rooted. I’m particularly interested in the gray areas — the ways we are both victims and perpetrators of violence — and in how we can move toward healing, accountability, and safety in ourselves and with each other.

The mediums of textiles and crafts often connect people to ancestors and elders in their family, forming a material bridge to experiences of generational trauma and violence. I am deeply invested in exploring the ways in which the intimacy of craft can allow memory to be a place of both softness and confrontation, and can aid us in having honest and vulnerable conversations. 

The artworks I construct draw on the storytelling traditions of religious iconography, fairy tales, and folk art to evoke memories of childhood, homes, rituals, and our daily lives. They blend comfortingly familiar elements with eerie qualities. Laying bare personal and collective shadows through haunting revelations in a journey towards accountability and healing.

I work with intentional slowness, often choosing the slowest techniques of hand embroidery and craft, so that slowness becomes its own kind of medium. A place where the precision of craft and mindful focus force deep consideration of how to visually represent these volatile subjects and allow time to distill chaotic moments.