Flutter and Fracture- Florence, Italy. Fall 2018.

In this body of work, I explore the feeling of pain, both physically and mentally, and how it can be healed or hurt by touch. In particular, I am interested in the intangibility of pain and how it is separated from the other senses. Pain is separate from the object; you cannot touch or taste it because it is not an object itself. It is something that cannot be heard or seen, but is a unique and indescribable feeling that is the breakdown of language. Through experimental mark making and line quality on the canvas, the wall, in time and in space, I am trying to express the feelings behind coping with chronic pain. I work with uncontrollable, true, and flawed lines that show both pain and processes of healing. This use of these experimental lines also deal with the ideas of touch, how it can be delicate or forceful, and the line quality can express these feelings. Through the use of analogy- the spine and its engagement with nature, I have created a series of work that dissects the feeling of pain into various senses. Natural elements incorporated into my work show a delicate, living side of pain; similar to the spine and my personal relationship with pain. Because of a past injury, I was inspired by the wax model of the spine in the La Specola museum. I fractured my lower spine almost 5 years ago, and even though the initial fracture is now healed, it will be forever weakened and is prone to chronic pain.
I am interested in art making as a healing process for both physical pain and anxiety, and the repetitive mark making and pattern like quality is created in a meditative, quiet way. Through the use of transparencies and light, I am showing how we can see through the pain, and that pain is not something to hold you back.