I was born in Berkeley, California, and raised in Ohio and Florida.

Imagine, 1,600,000 years ago, a prehistoric character points. There, in the moistened soil, the hominid Homo habilis draws a line, inscribing the first mark. The core of my work meditates on this scene as the unknowable origin of image making. Combining scientific research with speculative development, my paintings investigate and challenge a concept of origin within human evolutionary history. I pull from a range of digital media to contrast prehistoric imagery with technologized colors, posing my hominid characters in flattened, stylized scenes. These scenes

My MFA thesis work, Reliquaries, is an ongoing series of handrendered photocopies. For this project, I mine flea markets, antique stores, eBay, and other sources for analogue snapshots that predate the introduction of digital cameras. The goal is to find anonymous images with unintentional effects such as photographic mistakes, film processing errors, or signs of damage/decay.

The impression of what is not there interests me as much as what is there. I am attracted by the notion that, in an instant, a day, or a year later, our present reality will exist only as an illusion. Through chance, systems, and the use of ephemeral materials, I make paintings and sculptures that are inspired by the space between reality and perception, the present and the absent, the normal and the abnormal.

My work takes the form of mixed-media paintings that reflect the dynamic interplay of materials and address cultural transmission across national boundaries. Visual composites of parlor interiors, Delftware, and depression and carnival glass are forged through material curiosity. Objects commonly found in domestic spaces are symbolic references to class aspiration, fusing ornament and heirloom into hybrid sites of desire. A mélange of narrative idioms underpins a diverse collection of poured skins, digitized images, textiles, and sculpted foam. A transnational vernacular is

How many times have I played soccer in my life? Seen my parents lying in bed on a Sunday morning? Played ping-pong during school recess? Partied with friends at someone’s country house? I paint an idea: the feeling of repeated experiences, which are always different in their own way, condensed into one image. Combining visual references from life and photographs, and using my imagination, I re-create my memories as they feel and look inside my head. My paintings can’t be placed in a particular day, month, or year of my life, nor can they be understood as a literal, recognizable moment.

My paintings are a collision of three worlds from which we gather visual information: the subconscious world, the human world, and the natural world. In my work, I arrange things from all three in a synthetic way. I layer, cover, crop, and paint, using a variety of materials, including paint, mesh fabrics, and photography. This playful disorientation creates a space where things that should be separate can come together in the present moment, blurring into a meshwork of chaotic intersections.

I am interested in the underlying association between the spoken word, the sung word, and the painted image. I am primarily inspired by a recent musical movement that pairs centuries-old hymn texts with contemporary folk and rock tunes. In this pairing, the integrity of the lyrical structure and the theology of a hymn text remain intact while the tone of its dissemination is altered to accommodate a new audience. Considering this union in my own work, I rely on the subject matter, structure, and cadence of hymn texts to guide the creation of the paintings, all the while

In my most recent work, I re-create the interior of my studio apartment in Austin through the use of color and pattern. Space is compressed, layered, and abstracted through skewed perspective, pattern, collage, and layering. The work leans heavily toward maximalism, a way of making that can question the distinction between form and space as well as the logic of construction. I strive to create a feeling of alienation in the space, a sense of being overwhelmed though not confused.

My painting’s subject matter is primarily focused on individuality— how it creates distance, alienation, or cohesion. I am interested in how these paintings might give the viewer the sensation of defamiliarization. My intention is to produce new feelings from the experience of everyday objects or a familiar scene. Despite the fact that they are familiar things, the objects feel strange, remote, or somewhat cold. In my painting practice, I am drawn to this unusual realm, whether a real world or a new vacuum-like dream space. With my application of paint, I echo something that