Thank you all for coming out this evening, and thank you to everyone at Springfield Art Association for all that you’ve done to help me during my residency. 

I arrived in Springfield this past August with the intention to make a new body of work, and to allow myself to make without thinking too much about a distinct concept. My art background is in digital photography and photo installation and I was excited to utilize this residency to learn different mediums in art making. In the past, my work was generally made with a specific concept in mind, usually with a focus on familial identity and social issues, with an inclusion of a psychological analysis. I generally make work as a form of healing trauma and other life experiences as well as to let ideas unfold and for self-discovery. 

I am interested in psychology and therapy, the mind and consciousness, science and spirituality. I am interested in the gestalt - an organized whole that is perceived as more than the sum of its parts. I am interested in the way that everything is interconnected in a complex web of psychic, physical, and mysterious phenomena. I’m heavily influenced by the teachings of Ram Dass, Alan Watts, and Carl Jung. I am interested in Japanese philosophy such as wabi-sabi - a world view centered on the acceptance of transience and imperfection. The aesthetic is sometimes described as one of appreciating beauty that is "imperfect, impermanent, and incomplete" in nature. There are too many artists and especially women artists to name who influence me, however while making this work, I was thinking a lot about Eva Hesse and her evolution from painting to sculpture and string art. Before her death at the young age of 34 she said, “Life doesn’t last, art doesn’t last, it doesn’t matter.” With those words in my mind, she gave me permission to create unrestrictedly, to allow my truth to rise and manifest through this work. 

The work that you see in this room is an accumulation of my time here in Springfield and it is mostly displayed in chronological order in hopes to give the viewer a peek into my mind while I created. I’ve also included some notes as well as books that I read while I’ve been here. Books are extremely influential in my process, whether it’s indirectly and unconsciously or specifically cited. 

The title was conceived as I thought about how trauma lives in and is remembered through the body. While making the chickenwire sculptures, I wrapped it around my body and moved with the wire as an encasing; the resulting shapes carrying the energy of my body movement. Like a photograph, it captures a moving moment in time as well as the transformation of trauma through somatic movement.

Many artists, including myself, fall victim to perfectionism and institutional standards - and that perspective can be stifling and put limitations on the creative process. In response to this view of art, I wanted to allow myself the freedom to experiment and try new things without consideration of what I, or others, thought I “should” or “should not” be doing. I had been interested in sculptural work for some time but was somewhat hesitant to step outside my lane as I didn’t have any experience or training in this method of art making.

That being said, when I first arrived in Springfield, I spoke with Betsy about her expectations of me during my residency and she said “if you want this to be an experimental playground, it can be your experimental playground.” And that’s exactly what I did. After a short time, I began taking ceramics classes with Maggie and Anne and Kathy. I had never thrown on a wheel and don’t think I’ve hand-built anything in this manner since I was a child investigating the wonders of play-dough.

I also took a stained glass class with Morgan and brought to life an image of a dragon that has been living in my head for years. 

Betsy taught me the sprayed paper method early on in my residency term and it was fun to watch it come full circle from the first 2-D piece hanging on the wall to the life-size sculptural people in the center. Jason was also an integral part of my time here, assisting me in learning how to mold and cast as well as a plethora of other ideas and creations.

I recently saw a meme with a dragon sitting on a panda’s back that read, “What is more important,” asked the tiny dragon, “the journey or the destination?” To that - the giant panda replied, “the company.”

To Erin, Tom, Charlotte, Alley, Sarah, Ashlyn, Barbie, Mario, Michah, Sue, Donna, The Saal family and Dottie, Gretchen and Dolly, the people I’ve already mentioned and people that I’m sure I forgot to name - Thank you all for your help, your patience, your love, and for giving me permission to go beyond myself, to expand beautifully, imperfections and all.

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