Turn Me On, 2020

MFA Student

Major: Sculpture

Graduation Year: 2022

Artist Statement:

My practice reflects the objectified representations of my female body, aiming to intertwine the sexual and social normative. Sculptures, specific found objects, self portraiture, video based performance, and audio are the materials and formats used to create provocative works to subvert traditional notions of sex and identity. I create works that are imbued with the body, and use semiotics of bold colors and vignettes to abstract quotidian life, to break the silence of my childhood incest trauma. These strategies engage in forcing the politics of the personal to disorient and confront debates around gender, power, and the liberty of expression in art and life through my autobiographical work.
I explore my body as a tool and also an object to perform live, in videos and installations. I make my body representative to hold space for dialogue but take up space on the walls of institutions that continue to uphold colonial hierarchies. I am investigating intersectionality and nuances within feminism and the themes that objectify those preconceived notions. The body remembers. Psychological pain and suffering are the ways the body articulates traumatic experiences. I use trauma to create art. I intentionally arrange objects that reference the body and gender space evoke the sensations of post traumatic stress disorder. I make art to process, cope and rewire my brain’s understanding of the reality of PTSD. I assert agency and reclaim the lost power as a child now as a critical independent thinker and maker to advocate and educate having hard conversations around uncomfortable.