Painting

Madelines Night Journey, 2024, 9ft x 3ft, Acrylic, ink, mixed media on canvas.

In my piece Madeline’s Night Journey I wanted to explore a story of a person coming to terms with their identity and transitioning from one gender binary to the other - a journey based on my own experiences. Utilizing different mediums and combining painting with illustration, I wanted to create a visceral representation of the inner turmoil experienced by being born in the wrong body and the uncertainty that comes with transitioning to something new. The long-form painting takes its inspiration from scrolls and other sequential narratives throughout history which lends to my philosophy of people having ever-changing identities. Utilizing character design, the large horned figure is the manifestation of identity, representing the threshold between self-hatred on the left and the possibility of self-acceptance on the right. The piece is based on my own experiences from the past few years with grappling with my own gender identity and the depressive episodes that I was going through while making it. 

Valley Girl, 2024, 6ft x 6ft, Acrylic, oil pastel on canvas

Valley Girl was the first large-scale acrylic painting I created intentionally centered around no pre-planning of the piece. As I continued to paint the piece a story developed, one about being raised as a Catholic and being reluctant to abide by the Pope's doctrine, especially when he thinks people like me are innately sinful. The words present state “VALLEY GIRL” were added as a way to contrast the melodramatic scene of the pope as a devil and the blood reds of the left-hand side, giving the piece an added layer of irony on top of the present personal relationship with religion. 

Madeline's Melodrama, 2024, 9ft x 3ft, Acrylic, ink, oil pastel, mixed media on canvas

Madeline’s Melodrama was one of my first large-scale paintings incorporating multiple mediums and artistic styles. In this piece,  I experimented, for the first time, with a long-form scroll-like format. I continued this format in Madeline's Night Journey. The process of making this piece emerged from an extremely personal moment, resulting in choices reflecting my state of mind. This piece has influenced all of my artwork as I feel I truly found my unique and profound way of expressing myself through the use of painting, illustration, pastels, and lettering. Emphasizing this in-the-moment painting style I painted almost all of this piece with my hands, using large gestures and handfuls of paint to make an expressive narrative work. The piece follows my recurring character Madeline and her journey through many stages of her life and identity with experiencing depression in the dark factory setting and confronting a manifestation of profound personal meaning. Using these narrative and artistic techniques I sought to both express myself and to visualize the act of painting where the artist is inextricably linked to the piece in a visceral and personal way. 

Sad Pony Girl, Video, 00:05:25, 2024

Sad Pony Girl is a seven-minute film about social isolation. The film is split into three acts, following a protagonist who commutes home in a distressed state and an anxious state. The beginning follows the character commuting to the train station, the second act is commuting home from the train, and the third depicts the misery caused by isolating oneself from others. The color grading and distortion and other effects visualize the alienation of the protagonist from the rest of the world. The camera height and unusual movement detach the audience from the world surrounding the character, creating an uncomfortable and anxious experience. The driving idea behind making the work was visualizing my own commute home, my experiences with anxiety and depression at school, and my instinct to hide from my problems and isolate myself from others. It was also an attempt to reinterpret the surreal storytelling found in my large paintings in a new medium. The experimental visual effects and editing references the different landscapes found in my paintings and the music is a reimagining of the text boxes in my paintings.

Faces of My Femininity, 2024, 6ft x 4.5ft, Acrylic, ink, mixed media on canvas

Faces of My Femininity was a very experimental piece expressing the pain I felt during a depressive episode sparked by gender dysphoria and self-hatred. I utilized much more mixed media, character design, and words to emphasize the core idea of the different “faces” I see when I think of my preferred identity. There are repeating photos of me and uncanny anguishing figures -  all representing the alienation I feel with my femininity and physical body along with my idea of identity taking a similar form of an imposing, devil-horned figure. The expressive painting simulates the whirlwind of emotions I was feeling and the large format gives the situation an imposing and scary feeling, representative of my mental state regarding my identity and the particular moment of creating the piece.

Marriage with Misery, 2023, 26in x 18in, Oil on canvas

Marriage with Misery is the second piece in a diptych which comes after The Seer in the diptych’s narrative. This piece represents the “inner world” of the depiction of me in The Seer. I am lying down in a desolate desert with the LA skyline in the distance and a torrential storm representing my negative emotions approaching. I wanted to visualize the misery I felt at the time by hiding who I wanted to be, but also the idea that I couldn’t stop feeling miserable no matter how much I tried–I couldn’t live without it–hence the title of “marrying” misery.