Projects

"Emotions of Nature" Collection

Mixed media is one of my favorite mediums to use when creating art. For the past two decades I have been drawn to colorful dynamic pieces of art and objects throughout life. Using mixed media is a way for me to show a range of emotion in a piece. I want to capture these emotions and put them on paper similarly to what I did for my naturalesque figures. I use varying materials like watercolor, markers, glitter and acrylic paints. My goal was to take these elements and phenomena seen in nature and combine them with this idea of beauty, nature and emotions. While making these pieces, I kept the whimsical and colorful aspects that are often a staple in many of my works. 

In “Waves of Emotion” I decided to take an approach using the element of water to capture feelings of sadness, frustration and chaos that are often accompanied with anxious thoughts. The figure cries while holding a boat and an anchor in her hands showing how one often tries to anchor or weigh down their feelings. The waves in the hair shows boats staying afloat and sea creatures assure in their direction in the seas showing both balance amidst navigating what are often confusing emotions. 

My initial plan for this project was to build on previous ideas I had already developed for this collection and see how my skills have evolved since. I had a clear course of action, but while creating the newer pieces, I noticed that my ideas began to shift from the original sketches as fresher ideas came to mind. I knew from the beginning that I wanted my pieces to be large in scale, but after enlarging them, I felt something more was missing. To fill the void, I added more colors, patterns and shapes. The progression in the pieces is evident as the features within the first piece become more detailed looking from first to last.