Media: Oil Painting, Acrylic Painting, Drawing, Collage, Mixed Media

Growing up I have always been pulled in two different directions by the views of my parents, with strict and rigid expectations coming from my academic father and abstract, loose ideas from my former hippie mother. Because I've always felt pressured to appease both the strict and the abstract, I have a lot of conflicting ideas within my self. In this investigation, I explore how the conflicting ideas of my parents manifest within me.

Initially I utilized figure drawing to investigate actual people in my family, but as I tried to create more pieces I realized that these literal representations limited my ability to depict semi-abstract concepts like ideas and feelings. To solve this issue I started practicing collage, with layered paint as spills or taped off rigid lines. My concept became about the clash between the organic forms, representing the ideas of my mother, and the inorganic forms, representing my father.