Statement
The success of my practice thrives on the interaction with new communities and environments by connecting people with a nuanced understanding of the ecology surrounding them. My focus is on the creation of site-generated works of art that illuminate unobserved details of the everyday, and the challenges facing our environment, particularly within urban settings. I achieve this through a social practice of serving tea while listening and gathering stories about local histories, architectural landmarks, and the natural environment. Over the years while working as an artist-in-residence in France, Germany, Taiwan, Costa Rica, California, the Midwest and my home of New York City, my art career has developed into a process of working in collaboration with the public towards developing a body of work that focuses on being present within a place in order to affect change.
My inspiration is based on exploring how we manage the constant flux of life by inviting community interaction across a virtual threshold constructed out of materials with meaning such as handmade paper from seasonal detritus, living plants, recycled found objects and tea to create a sense of elegance out of the simplest of gestures. My intent is to evoke a visceral social encounter within a shared space that comments on the tenuous relationship between nature and humans within the built environment. I am intrigued with the process of creating a controlled environment where the work organically develops and changes over time, as a metaphor for the constant state of entropy surrounding us.
