who?

I was born in the mountains of Colorado.  At 18, I moved to NYC to study painting at The Art Student's League. At 21, I traveled around the world for a while to paint and write.  A few years later I received my MFA in interdisciplinary arts from Vermont's Goddard College. I have presented my multidisciplinary work in a number of public and private spaces around the globe. I am a 2010 RACC grant recipient, was key artist in residence at the Washington County Arts Council in Washington, PA and my collaborative project - Soul Recovery Systems - was nominated for an Index Design Award (Design to Improve Life) for 2013. By day I work as a Creative Director, Art Director, and Designer. I live in Portland, Oregon with my main squeeze - painter Michael T. Hensley - daughter, and two cats. 

what? why? how?

Like most artists, my practice includes absorbing the present and translating it into something - a performance, words, an image, a song, etc.. To do this I examine hidden and/or forgotten spaces, I gather missing or unspoken words in conversations, I collect bits from my subconscious, I explore everyday rituals (the eating, procuring and preparation of food, love and relationships, driving in traffic, "work work", the weather, public billboards, the internet, home shopping networks, dirty closets, urban sounds, and so much more), and I observe the endlessly inappropriate, whimsical, sexual, political, playful, loving, and emotional surroundings in their real or digitized form. 

Ideas come from a combination of mishaps, flaws, absurdity, and everyday tomfoolery. The ideas may start with a single word or a combination of words; a quavering, confident, inarticulate, demonic, humorous, forlorn voice; something someone said about the weather; a blurred image seen only through peripheries; an intoxicating smell or flavor; a multilayered dream; a wobble of emotions; a crooked line; or the pile of dust in the corner of my bedroom. Most ideas come when I'm least expecting them.

Questions I like to ask myself over and over again:

What is nourishment? What consumes me? What do I consume? What consumes the world? How can I live each moment artfully? What is the difference between living artfully and living ordinarily? How might our social circles change if we were to say everything? How does language change or define our social circles? How can art change or define our social circles?