In all its various forms and configurations my work the past seven cross references painting, stitching, landscape, textile, miniature worlds, psychedelics and science – from botany to mycology to planetary and solar – touching on the micro and macro scales. Based on observation of “the real,” I make work that has magical and fantastical elements that combine to create tactile fiber based ecotopias. Through techniques such as embroidery, needle felting, cyanotype, print making and quilting I create descriptions of flowers, mosses, mushrooms, lichen, etc. The mirrors and kaleidoscopic elements in my work create a psychedelic component that reference the theory of the infinite (and it is a theory!) while simultaneously pointing out the mythology and fantasy that we have an infinite reserve of forests, plants, bees, glaciers, animals etc.
The Flowers Bees Love series describes favorite flowers that bees love to pollinate. By depicting these specific flowers, the work references the endangered bee population - a consequence of human created circumstances such as urbanization, pesticides, pollution and climate change - and hence the importance of pollination – a process which impacts food production, biodiversity, plant growth, wild plant growth and wildlife habitats.
I use the age-old process of the cyanotype to create records of disappearing life. I collect antique linen – special functional objects - handwork made by women of the past (tablecloths, doilies, napkins, antimacassars) and make sun prints from actual flowers that bees love, and then embellish the pieces with embroidery, preserving the tactile signatures of flowers while simultaneously commenting on the endangered bee population. I am interested in what can be expressed using such common craft materials such as felt, pipe cleaners, crepe paper, cotton quilt fabrics, wire, wool etc. The materials and colors and textures have an artificial feel that allude to human created circumstances such as global warming and climate change while at the same time I describe the magnificence of what is at stake. The Cyanotype Moons are a new series that employ these everyday crafting materials to create mysterious, eery, magical worlds in the twilight of flower and embellished cyanotype “moons.”
The “Flowers Under Domes” allude to specimen research and observation and the Victorian era of collecting, investigation and preservation of plants and flowers. Though based on actual flowers, their realism morphs into somewhat fantastical depictions that combine patterns from nature, textile, stitching and print making: blue morpho butterfly, turkey tail mushroom, monarch butterfly, French knots, plaids and cyanotypes. Hand-stitched, fabricated, collaged and assembled flowers are encased by glass domes where they are preserved and protected.
From the exterior the Pedestal Terrariums appear to be the type of pedestals found in galleries or “white cubes” - a term coined by critic/artist Brian O’Doherty to describe the modernist obsession with a neutral white aesthetic. Subverting the assumption that gallery/museum pedestals serve as neutral supports to display art, the Pedestal Terrariums offer round portal viewing holes for exploration into deep biotic 3D “through the looking glass” worlds of infinity forests that are sketches of changing light, color, textures, hues, and lines of the plants, flowers, lichens, mosses, landscapes small and large around us, as reflected and distorted by mirrors. The mirrors and kaleidoscopic elements in my work create a psychedelic component that reference the theory of the infinite (and it is a theory!) while simultaneously pointing out that an infinite reserve of our forests, flowers, plants, trees, bees, glaciers, animals, birds, seas and air is not a reality. It is indeed a fantasy.
The term “still life” (coined by the Dutch) is known in French as nature morte – which translates to dead nature or nature dead. The Pedestal Terrariums are essentially contemporary still lifes – wooden containers that hold objects of varying textures: flowers (fiber), shiny interior mirrors, a circular glass viewing window and an influential light source. The species of the flowers selected are common every day ones yet they have tremendous symbolic meaning. They are particular flowers (poppy, purple cone flower, buttercup, bee balm and rugosa rose) that bees and other pollinators love.
“We can describe the flower as full of everything. There is nothing that is not present in the flower. We see sunshine, we see rain, we see clouds, we see the earth and we also see time and space in the flowers.”
(Thich Nhat Hahn)