In these paintings, I use only recycled objects. The usage of these, previously worn, everyday objects conceptually follows Rauschenberg’s “gap between the everyday world and painting”. I often choose fashion objects that signal or are previously worn on the human body. These used objects contain traces; of ghosts, panache, fables, declarations, stories and other information buried by the previous wearer or owner of the object. My work becomes an arcing palimpsest—something reused or altered but still bearing visible traces of its earlier form. I am interested in what is passed down in the human trace & its evolution.
My work does not follow the traditional expectations of painting. The canvases have become unhinged from their stretcher bars, no longer reflecting a direct window or wall format, but a portal. These are paintings that have transitioned off the frame and its corresponding art historical context.
Coming from my previous fashion study, I first drape and sew the fabric and clothing, to build up a topography. I do not start with overt planning, rather allowing the topography to freely associate and build itself accordingly. Other objects are added as they relate to this topography. Gestural painting is then applied to reorient, activate, connect, highlight or excavate meaning. The emphasis is upon the plurality of social and cultural forces that construct a context. For me, these reincarnated paintings, represent shape-shifters celebrating the mythological to the ontological of human passage.
In their use of textile and fashion media, the work embraces an effeminate offering to integrate the beholder. Often clothing is positioned in some relationship to the viewer’s approximate body. I am hopeful that by activating the viewer’s body into the painting, the viewer adds their own history, markers or feelings. I see these paintings as more in a tapestry format, usually being freed from the wall either by hovering slightly or suspended from the ceiling; therefore pushing out into the space of the viewer. Again I see these paintings as portals connecting and reflecting our human journey through various perspectives and lens, past and present.