As I’ve come into my own as an artist, the concept of relationships has taken its grip on me. Relationships between people, places, space, feelings, the list goes on. Looking back at my work from before I began implementing nuanced concepts, I saw this thread connecting them with a theme I had never considered. This idea of relationships, their part in my world and the world at large, had been on my mind unknowingly for a while. Seeing it in front of my face, I am able to dig deeper and deeper into it, asking many questions and working towards their answers. How do people relate to one another? How do people relate to space? How do they react to limitations on that space? What is the difference between observing and participating in a relationship? How do these create perceptions of people as individuals and groups? Inspired by Tania Bruguera, and later Amalia Pica, I began an exploration through the use of public communal space, allowing people to interact with one another through the use of acrylic paint, paper, painting prompts, and setting rules within that. That project jump started my deep dive into this subject matter, leading me to where I am today.
Within my exploration of abstract relationships between myself, others, space, and feelings, I’ve come to develop a library of communal works that I use to create interpretations of these relationships as works, inspired by Mark Bradford’s process-based works. The idea of the process of a work being a part of it became important to these pieces and projects, with the steps between a stranger’s mark becoming an abstract portrait being just as important as the final piece. Paralleling limitations between myself and the communal pieces, choosing how to form the mark making, curating others’ contributions, choosing the materials I work on are all vital to my work.
As I developed the concept further this year, I began to turn the questions I had for others onto myself. How do I relate to space, my feelings, my peers? I’ve historically not enjoyed creating work for or about myself, but reversing such a deep interest into my internal changed that. I began to look for answers to these questions, both simple and complex, through abstract explorations and participating in my communal projects. Using these works based on my own relationships, I create a gateway of vulnerability that allows others to relate to me. Like my works from years ago, even in a deep dive into myself, the focus of others’ relationships finds its way to the forefront.