Artist Statement
My ‘Gaia Illuminations’ directly engage with the theory and practice of ecological relationship, systems of knowledge and magic, and mythologies that help us grapple with cosmic vastness, chaos and uncertainty. I use hand-made inks, herbs, pigments, and gold leaf on paper, as well as print and painting media, to create visual essays and book-arts musings in the tradition of illuminated manuscripts. My explicit intent is to expand the scope of calligraphic illumination’s cultural reliquary beyond anthropocentrism. I investigate nature/culture dualism through the lens of deep ecology, and face my own hopes and skepticisms through layered symbolic and totemic images, organic textures, and text. The literary, the aesthetic and the sensory are crucial partners with no hierarchy in the development of my work— and in this way I seek to honor the intellectual, the empathic and the experiential potential of human creativity in my efforts to investigate our interrelatedness to other beings and their agency.
The Aesthetics of the Felt World
My MFA Thesis Manuscript is bound and published by the Arcadia Fine Arts library at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts. This writing and research continues, using the published manuscript as an outline for additional scholarship. New material and publishing opportunites forthcoming in 2019 and 2020.
