STEWARDSHIP ~ NOT SEPARATION
Last month, I invited you all to complete a little Check-In Survey to help me gauge how you are feeling as we approach the rest of the year, and transition into 2027. I greatly appreciate everyone who took time to answer my questions! If you would still like to answer the survey, please feel free to do so by clicking the following link.
As we brace ourselves for the Mid-term elections and 2027, I have been visualizing what ways I can work meaningfully with my community through my art (e.g. see flyer to the right! ~ more info below). I am especially excited to be working closer with my fellow artists to create more empowering gatherings so I encourage you to keep up with my Instagram posts for the remainder of the year to stay abreast of what we all can look forward to as we enter the new year.
For now, I wanted to let you all know that you can expect to see my newsletters appearing in your inbox on a more quarterly basis to give me more time to reflect.
That being said, I wanted this newsletter to serve as your “guide” for the rest of the year— a letter that details the direction my work is going as I get ready to release my next collection in the new year, and what days we all can look forward to so we can help contribute to a future that feels more just and sustainably conscious.
A CULTURE OF STEWARDSHIP AND NOT SEPARATION
Evidence of human influence on the natural world has always been about relationships. My earlier work emerged from a period of personal grief when painting became a way of understanding the power required to endure what cannot be changed - the power to remain open in the presence of suffering. Over time, that investigation expanded and what began as a personal inquiry became broader and in time turned to one asking about our efforts to heal and to a larger question - what happens when a culture
mistakes domination for relationship?
That question sits beneath nearly everything I am making today.
Greek myth is a useful lens through which to explore. Phaethon is often interpreted as a cautionary tale about pride. A young man, desperate to prove himself, takes control of his father Helios’s solar chariot and loses control of it resulting in the earth burning, forests consumed and rivers drying up. What interests me is not his arrogance but rather his misunderstanding. Phaethon believed he could possess power without understanding his place within the system. He mistook participation for ownership and relationship for authority. In that sense, Phaethon feels surprisingly contemporary as an enduring description of a recurring human temptation leading to separation.
When I began developing the ideas that led to my series Roadkill I found myself returning to that same point – that the animals in these paintings are not merely animals, but indicators, evidence and witnesses of separation.
Their presence speaks of the invisible decisions that shape the environments around them as the visible consequence of thousands of choices. Choices about expansion, development, convenience and consumption. Choices that accumulate until a living thing finds itself trapped inside an environment that was never designed for its survival and is more zoo than the intended magnificence.
In this way, my work is less interested in the individual events and more in the resultant systems. Less interested in victims than in psychological frameworks erected to protect or embellish. Charles Eisenstein describes modern culture as being shaped by what he calls a "story of separation" the belief that human beings are fundamentally separate from one another and from the living world around them. Our headlines expose a world in chaos and catastrophes of a world being pushed to the brink. Is it wrong to take comfort that our fore-bearers faced their own critical worries and seemly pushed through? Or has the time come to reexamine this system of separation and begin to apply social and natural stewardship to our menu of crises?
What would our grandmothers say?
YOU ARE INVITED!
Come out a special exhibit highlighting some awesome artists! I will be showing a piece I created especially for this event ahead of the Midterms. We will be joined by the League of Women Voters, who have been working hard to support marginalized communities vote and understand the politics of our time, Learn more about them at the below link!
MORE DATES TO REMEMBER OCTOBER
NOVEMBER
DECEMBER
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For the next 3 months, stay tuned to my Instagram for more updates and news regarding my next collection and exhibitions! |
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