Date

Spring 2022

Exhibit Images

Download

Download Full Text (1.8 MB)

Thesis Committee Chair

Lily Lee, MFA

Thesis Committee Members

Astri Snodgrass, MFA

Kate Walker, MFA

Artist's Statement

My work navigates romantic interpersonal relationships and allows the viewer a sense of self within a framework and visual imagery that is inherently rooted in lesbian identity. The work takes the form of a series of loosely representational oil paintings on wooden board and stretched canvas, ranging in scale from 6x8 inches to 56x66 inches. The works are arranged according to color, level of representation, and scale. Small works contain the figure at varying scales in all square formats and the larger are approximately to scale with a human body according to the parameters of depicted space. I am inviting the viewer to take part in a relationship, or find themselves in what I have described, and what they know from prior experiences. In each of my paintings, there are two figures, female presenting, existing in a domestic place defined by its cohabitants and its awkward ongoing construction which often emulates that of the dialogue between two lovers and co-creators of this place. In my work, I am asking the viewer to bear witness to an emotional and contiguous intimacy between two people in a domestic space, and through ambiguity, I am asking the viewer to find themselves there as well. Ambiguity in this context is intended to invite a viewer into the work, foregrounding the work in relationship as something worthy of and in need of investigating. This can be accessed visually through a mode of figure painting that strays from a certain standard of figure painting while also intending to focus on establishing an open ended narrative. Through the represented figures’ mix of body language and physical proximity to one another, the goal of the work is to have the viewer, for a moment, share this space through the image I've created.

From Which We Were Absent

Share

COinS