Bugs and Dolls

Forever interested in color, objects and words, I want to create imagery that resembles a
daydream and invokes a sense of symbolic space. I love imagery, like Gregor Schneider’s work that is aesthetically pleasing in unorthodox ways and may be perceived as both bizarre and beautiful.

My imagery this quarter has concerned itself with silk moths, silkworms and their cocoons within the curious spaces of dollhouses (see image one) and a couple of posable dolls. Through these subjects I have played with scale and used objects as surrogates for people with my own photo reference as source material. I am interested in understanding interpersonal relationships, using insects as biological metaphor examining dependency and addiction and as memento examining the cycle of life. The doll imagery has been in development for a long, slow while. Nearly 4 years ago I first began to photograph scenarios using pose-able dolls in environments. (Actually, I was interested to re-discover a photograph labeled “first picture I ever took” that proves my pictorial interest in dolls started MUCH earlier, see image five.) I am interested in capturing moments of solitude when we meet with our inner selves and in exploring elements of ill-defined female friendships and the space in which these relationships exist (see image four, circa 1985, featuring my BF Trisha and I). I think the bugs and dolls may first seem understandable and innocent but really invite the viewer into darker and less settled places. While my concepts are personal and emotionally loaded, I don’t require this specific depth of understanding from the viewer.

I have been inspired by the Art Nouveau posters of Alphonse Mucha and stately images of American painter and illustrator Maxfield Parrish (see image two) who used the same models over and over within his beautiful estate full of artful objects. I have sought the romance and still introspection I get from these graphic, illustrative paintings. I have worked with saturated color schemes and metallic accents. I have added layers of information with inks and by hand. I have struggled and learned through failure in humbling ways (see evidence of prior attempts of screen printing when the screen was actually silk, image three) while staying true to my creative vision and ambition.