Statement

My work features depictions of subliminal places that are filled with found organic object, fabrications, and erasure of space. Decisions in these spaces are fueled by mental affliction and how our subconscious dictates our consciousness. Anxiety and impending intrusive thought have transformative qualities. They bend our hyperconscious mind, rendering emotional fortitude almost dormant. The altercations that the subconscious play on our intuition interest me greatly. This parasitic entity of mental illness converts fevered thoughts into reality, convoluting what is real and what is figment.

The work is referential to portions of actual landscape. These small intricacies I find are sustained by the meditative practice of wandering and studying the landscape. In context to the flora and fungi, my own body’s vulnerability was made unmistakable. When rendering these natural objects, I want to achieve a personal sense of touch akin to tenderness. Then conveying the murkiness of disturbed thought, I cover the drawing with an application of paint, collage, or sensual mark making.

Intrusions in the subconscious mind are referenced as anomalies. These are artificial combinations of flora and fungi that appear with uneasy familiarity. These intrusions start to bend reality for our subconscious, which in turn warps the perception of our consciousness. This invasion degrades at fortitude, memory, and rationalization. The ephemeral quality of the work mimics the after effects of intrusions. Implementing a false inebriation, this anxiety strips us of humanity and pride.

While these drawn flora or fungi are kept visible, others are covered. This insinuates that the intrusive thoughts are hidden deep away in the psyche. Being able to see the subject partially under applications of paint reminds us how alarmingly clear the invasive controls the subconscious. Among the altered drawings, the absence of space prevails. This term is abyssal space, an overwhelming negative space that the drawn forms float in. In its blankness it exudes anxious thought. Referencing lack of emotion and the act of disassociation, it is comparable to an amniotic sack. Between figure and ground there are multitudes of layers, a signification of body and mind alike.

Not being able to differentiate thought from reality drives the host of this parasite down a path of self-destruction. Alongside the disassociated consciousness, the absence of pride has left tender soreness. The intrusive continues to delve into the interior, exemplifying tarnished memory. Erasing and replacing the past, present, and future experiences with bombardments of intrusion, we cannot control the dreams we weave, just like how we cannot control our subconscious.