I have always been drawn to portraiture, especially self-portraits.  If you browsed through the walls of my family home you would find a timeline of my childhood through the transforming depictions of my face.  Self-portraits from the shaky hand of a crayon-clad fourth-grader (I remember tracing pre-cut ovals for the face shape) to the confident hand of high school charcoal portrait me.  I found comfort and solace in recreating my face over and over, I found self-assurance in those depictions- especially when my parents and teachers raved about how “good” it was.  

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When I went to college for Art Education I had that cliche moment of realizing there were other people who were as good as me, or better.  See, up until this point, I still recognized art as stagnant, with this art “good” and this art “bad.”  I was driven to validate my abilities by entering into the Bachelor of Fine Arts (BFA) major along with Art Education, and being accepted into that second major was like the praise I had received up until college.  I thought to myself, I am a good artist, after all.  It was only when I was overworked, laboring in 21 credits a semester, and about to rip my hair out did I realize that my art and sanity were suffering.  In my search for confirmation of my talents, I reduced my artwork to only what I thought others wanted.  I hadn’t made a self-portrait in a while.  I wasn’t even sure if I wanted to make a self-portrait like I always had before.

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After I dropped the BFA, I turned to create self-portraits again, but in a way that demonstrated myself far more than my face ever would.  I recreated memories where I was surrounded by the most important people in my life, family, and friends.   I looked through photos, candid and imperfect, like a memory.  I wanted to explore sharpness and contrast, despite how messily conjoined in happiness we were.  Through these images and navigating my recollection of these memories, I was aiming to create fluidity and control, using one continuous line as much as possible.  This juxtaposed with compositions of stacked bodies and irrational color choices.  The process of creating these works reminded me of the comforting craziness of my friend group, and the thread that ties us together through having these shared experiences.  

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Through them I have grown beyond the insecurities I brought to college in my artwork and in myself, and in so doing the bonds we have created define me more than anything else.  My face may still be included in these images, but I am creating them simply because I enjoy looking back at these crucial moments in my life- which are not even crucial at all when you look at it on the surface.  We are snuggled up watching TV or acting like goofy maniacs. I am confident in my abilities beyond what others may contribute; as I have learned that the process of creating is like the relationships in my life, it is the in-between moments that matter most.