The Power for creating a better future is contained in the present moment: You create a good future by creating a good present.
-Eckhart Tolle
CREATION, EVOLUTION
I am engrossed in reenacting narratives and stories I have been a part of throughout my life. The people I have met have led me to make what I need to make. With some people, I share long, deep relationships, while with others, I share just a brief conversation. Each conversation leads to an additional insight or outlook. One conversation can be crucial in creating a new pathway toward the truth. The paper figures reflect these experiences. The paper figures also anticipate experiences I wish to have in the future, experiences I will have, and interactions with people I will meet. As a result, the installation also represents the interaction of the past, the present, and the future.
WORLDS THAT FEEL UNEARTHLY
Paper Collages, 11" by 17"
A Fable:
Talia was born in the mystical landscapes of the country to her mother, with multiple lenses, and her father, who possesses a great builder’s mind. This curly-haired, blue-eyed girl grew up on a vivacious farm with many creatures.
Sitting on the porch on a cool spring day, an expected visitor fluttered around her, inviting her to the creek across the field, below the tall evergreens. Walking on the stones nearby, Talia lost her balance and glided in to the water. Nervous with fright, while underwater, small little people began to appear. Little fairies and figures danced in highly textured, colorful landscapes. These colorful worlds were previously unseen to Talia. There were new and exciting people made of plant textures, hazy blue indigo grass with glowing orange skies. Some people seemed otherworldly, with exaggerated features and elongated bodies. They were made out of flower patterns with gold wire for hair.
Amazed with these colorful little worlds that surrounded her, Talia began to release more and more bubbles from her mouth, as she was running out of air. She began to resurface quickly, but soon realized one of the little textured people found its way into a bubble and resurfaced with her. Gasping for breath as she hit the surface, a bubble floated with the figurine inside. Excited about her new discovery, Talia caught her breath and dived down into the cool water. Opening her eyes, she frantically swirled around, looking for the little worlds. To her dismay they never appeared. They were out of sight. She resurfaced looking for the figurine in the bubble. Where was her friend from the creek? “Here young girl” a calm, soft-spoken voice said.
“You will go and paint these worlds you have seen. You will forget about them for years, however they will seep back into your memory when time permits. Don’t worry now about where the others went. They will soon appear within sight. I will be with you whether or not you are conscious of me, to catch you when you are falling, to wake you from your unconscious state. Look for your paintings in nature to validate your intuitive truth.”
As time progressed, Talia grew and attended school. Throughout her middle and high school years, she took many intensive academic art courses. During her tenth year of schooling, she visited the west coast of South America. She went out into the mystical lands of the mountains so that she was immersed in nature. Walking along a steep path, a huge gust of wind overtook her. She began falling fast, unable to gain her footing, as she slid down the heavy steep mountain. “This is the end, the end of life,” she thought. Looking nowhere but down, and thinking her life was going to end, a man emerged to catch her from her downward spiral. She gained her composure and whirled around looking for the man, yet he was nowhere in sight.
Upon returning to the States, she continued with her rigorous yet delightful art training. In her seventeenth year of training, she was guided in to the art of collaging many small papers. Excessive paper cutting overtook her, and she became fascinated with the multitudes of small, white paper cutouts of people. This cutting – people-making – continued for a long time.
In the eighteenth year of her training, Talia decided to return to South America, based on her need for the beautiful colors she was remembered there. She made her way through many different paths to a small city, nestled among the grandness of Mother Earth’s nature and the vastness of her mountains. Unbeknownst to Talia, she was about to experience some wild things! Oh, the holy sacred sights! Talia never realized the great abundance of the universe until then. All her secret thoughts about life – the things she knew to be true – were true. She believed we could transcend the physical world with consistent meditation – and by making art or music. She wondered about other spirits and beings that might act as our guides through dangerous situations. Talia’s feelings resonated as if they were the most truth she would ever have. There was no physical proof of these things, and they could not be perceived with the five senses. Afterward, people dismissed Talia’s ideas, chiding her for entertaining these thoughts, but she knew them to be true.
Quite by accident, Talia encountered and entered many sacred spaces and holy sites. As she turned the corner, her eyes fell on a distant rocky landscape. It melted into the presence of one of her paintings, and fields of red and gold emerged from the rocks. As she journeyed, landscapes she walked through reflected her previous paintings back to her. New encounters with ancient geographies, echoing paintings she had constructed five years back. The proof of her intuition was exposed to her, directly in front of her. It was tangibly in front of her.
Again, Talia returned to the States and began her nineteenth year of training as an artist. All of a sudden and still, there was an incessant need to make paper people, but not out of white paper. Colored paper called to her! Little silhouettes began to emerge from a stack of highly textured and patterned papers. Talia blinked a few more times, and there came realizations and memories came from her childhood. Talia conjured the truest period of her – or any – life, when she was in tune and touch with worlds beyond the physical, worlds that feel unearthly. This world of hopes and ideas was where tranquility emerged, embodied in the most beautifully amazing colors and textures. Forms and figures emerged from that time that she might otherwise have forgotten.
BEYOND PRELIMINARY PERCEPTION
The surfaces of the Cylinder depict many different narratives. I aim to tell stories that everyone can relate to in some way – the stories rhyme with things viewers may have thought of once, sights they may have seen, dreams they have had, and dreams they would like to come true. The paper people moving across the Cylinder are having interactions with one another. They are experiencing emotions, thinking, wondering, observing, feeling, relating, and ultimately structuring their space. It is a space where a viewer and witness and can feel these same emotions. Even while individual viewers enter the space of the Cylinder alone, they are not by themselves. Inside this space, viewers have the choice of where to look, whom to understand, and which emotions or experiences to partake in. This is a glorious world, one where many silhouetted figures exist on one of two planes.
White silhouettes emerge and disappear as the viewer walks around the cylinder. The sheer fabric invites the viewer to understand the inside of the cylinder with more clarity – however complete clarity is not understood from the outside. From the outside, the viewer is only exposed to one world, as all the visible silhouettes are white.
Upon entering the Cylinder, the white figures transform. Visible on one plane is a population of white figures that shift into a dreamy indigo blue – and now an iridescent gold – and now blue – and gold. Interacting with these luminous bodies is another population of colorful and textured silhouettes. These generous bodies encircle the viewer, and a greater understanding of this world is available from here – inside it.
I offer viewers the opportunity to discover something beyond their preliminary perception and assessment – something that can be experienced only once one’s point of view and perspective have shifted. I imagine that the paper people enjoy their own experiences with others inside this dimension. As the silhouettes disappear and reappear, I am reminded of people I see – and the people I do not or cannot see – people whom I remember or dream of – people whom I haven’t met yet. These people are not present here, but they are all real – occupying different spaces, forms, or times, but they are real.
Installation, 2016
MAGICAL STREETS OF CUSCO
We were walking in Cusco, my mom and I. We came to an area of sidewalk where a reflected glow overpowered the cobblestones. It created a magical ethereal texture that we could be a part of – right there in Cusco at 9:00 am. The sun had just risen emerged above the tops of the buildings across the street. The buildings’ dark silhouettes faded as the sun’s gold overpowered the street. Maybe this moment made a portal into a different dimension – maybe color does this. This was a surreal space embedded in a physical space – or layered on top of it – or running in parallel. It is a brief moment of power, as color and texture overpower the space or substance of the person. The logical identities of things surrender to their chroma. The ethereal and intuitive overpower the physical and rational. The world is not solid – it keeps changing.
A METAPHOR FOR HUMANITY'S MANY INDIVIDUALS
The mandala collages are important to me, since they articulated a deep need I had felt to structure a set of complex – but orderly – spaces. In each mandala, twelve sections repeated themselves. There was a unique orderly system applied to each of them, as small intricate pieces were cut out of collage materials and repurposed as painterly marks. Colors and patterns combined with each other. Careful repetition brought order to the larger whole. Paper fragments coalescing into elegant compositions became metaphors for humanity’s many individuals coming together as one. Some collages incorporated multiple colors and patterns, holding various formal elements in a tense and seemingly fleeting moment of unity. Others were built on shared formal principals, as varied hues, tones, tints, and shades of blue worked together, or as multiple chromatic grays interacted on the page.
Most of the mandalas were about twelve inches in diameter. Some areas were blurry, while others had more crisp patterns. Each was constructed out of 108 cut out pieces. As a result, each composition was characterized by a high level of implied texture from the appropriated imagery, along with varying amounts of physical texture from the gluing and layering of the paper pieces. Some highly textured patterns felt very busy, as if time were racing by, while other soft-focus areas suggested the idea of time passing more slowly. Time and space operated in different ways across the small collages.
Paper Collage 12'' by 12''
TIME STANDS STILL
I have always loved to draw my own portrait. It is very intimate. I am alone in a space with soft music and a strong light source, and in this space, I can wonder about anything. Why I am here? Why I was born in this body? Why is this my image? Why do I have the parents and siblings that I have? Why is my life made up of these particular experiences? Why do I meet the people I do – or better yet – how? Why do I feel the way I do around another individual? And how is that response different from just being?
When drawing myself, I am accompanied by very soft mystical music. I examine my current feelings and emotions. My physical body is mostly still. Time stands still. When I am making or figuring a portrait of myself, I am confronting some sliver of truth that allows me to take control of a moment in which to just be me – who I am – just how I am. The individual portraits are not drawn with exactly the same proportions. Every hairstyle is always slightly different; earrings and clothes differ. The way the layered values are applied is different every time. This body of work offers a physical representation of how I have evolved in appearance – if I evolve in appearance. My physical, corporeal self is a metaphor for my mental self, my emotional self, my dream self, my psyche, my complete being. Physical shifts across the series of drawings indicate that other shifts are happening. Like all humans, I am forever undergoing a total transformation.
graphite and fiber on paper 24'' by 18''
ONE PERSON AMONG THE MANY
My work is about freedom, and my current projects evolved from paintings that describe freedom in the form of landscapes in vast space. My older work has many colors and textures in unnatural combinations. The primary focus is to achieve a separate space from this world. The painted spaces offer viewers other options for their bodily and spiritual existence. Viewers can look at patterns, textures, and color and be transported somewhere else.
My ideas and approaches encompassed textile pieces, drawings, and acrylic paintings on canvas during the period prior to my three-year journey at FAU. Textures and patterns with various colors generated the ideas behind the work. Narrative followed form. My intent was to emphasize my ideas of freedom by creating two-dimensional spaces where this freedom could exist. I made places I wanted to be – places of discovery, places with positive vibes. Many of the paintings – the physical works – were fairly large in size, reaching out laterally to encompass the viewer. Making this work tested my hypotheses regarding how I would feel when being surrounded by such vibrant colors, textures and patterns. Each painted composition created a different mood when paired with another. They were independent universes functioning in parallel. I wanted to enter these universes and experience these emotional states for long periods.
I realized that I was making the work for myself, however I am one individual embedded in the whole of humanity. Therefore, I acknowledged that the work I was making was simultaneously for everyone else. We all experience joy, fear, restriction, freedom, anxiety, and wonder. These are shared experiences and understandings. School provides a space to learn, and it is a place where individuals who share common interests can convene and communicate. I love to be in environments where I can conduct a discussion and have an exchange with others who share my passion for making.
acrylic and thread on canvas
IN THE BAHAMAS WITH WILD DOLPHINS
I am on the Island of Bimini in the Bahamas, participating in a breath meditation workshop. We gather in the large white room, sitting on top of yoga mats, and an ancient voice guides the breathing exercises. In through the nose – sometimes fast – sometimes slow – and now angry breaths – and now graceful breaths. Each breath relates to time, feeling, and emotion. We are tired and fatigued – and alive – and dizzy. Forty-five minutes become one hour, and I am exhausted. I lie back on my yoga mat, and my body feels light – so light it can be carried by the wind – by the graceful waves. I remain still. I can hear my body and feel it function. I feel strong and alive. It is hard to leave this space, as I do.
I am overwhelmed with the vast green and blue sea. A multitude of colors – of hues – engulfs me. The roaring waves allow me to feel insignificant in some ways. They demand more of a presence than I am as I – quiet, barefoot and of golden brown flesh – take light steps around the balcony. Stuck small grains of sand separate my feet from the concrete. The day holds many opportunities – kayaking, canoeing, boat adventures. The day holds conversations at breakfast with friends – some whom I have known for quite some time and others whom I have just recently met. I feel closer to some of these people than I do to others. Most smile. In this space, they are excited. In this world, they are separate from the other ordinary worlds they live in. Here they are surrounded by the sea. Here they are with others who desire similar things. Here they are with others searching and exploring. Here they are with others whom they resemble. Here they have no identity. Here there are no expectations. Here, individuals can embody their own raw nature – more intuitive behavior. Here, individuals can share with one another – most of the others being nearly anonymous people whom they have just met for the first time. And here, they unexpectedly meet dolphins.
I dive into the deep blue sea – a rush of cool water breezes through my body. I glide deeper, and my hair becomes straight immediately. My silhouette takes many forms – upside down, right side up, a series of contorted shapes. I can exist in many positions and defy gravity here, and this feels like another freedom. I need not be upright to function. I can be however I want – fast flips, grabbing my own feet, karate kicks with my hair standing on end above me. Everything down here feels dreamlike. Is this a subconscious state? I feel time becoming delayed and slowing down. My mind is free from obligations, restrictions, have-to-do’s, work, school. So I fill it with photos – mental photos – as I remain here in the vast sea.
They arrive so fast – swarming, playing, flipping. They have speed, free will, and a seeming interest in entering our space just to hang out. There are seven of them. The first time arrived that a wild dolphin looked me in the eye. I saw its eye and regarded the rest of it – silky flesh in a few shades of grey, darker on top and much lighter shades on the bottom.
photograph of fabric installation
A Moment I Found Myself ...
This documents a moment I found myself walking into landscapes I had been painting about 5-10 years previous. So to those who are artists, musicians, thinkers, dreamers ... trust your intuition and that what you create - because soon you may find yourself walking in to the landscapes you have been dreaming about!
