Artist Statement
My work contains strong religious undertones and has often been described as “Catholic” in nature and aesthetic— clean, pure, and ordered. At the same time, many of the surfaces and materials I use simulate flesh in order to evoke the body, an alluring and seductive association of great significance. Using the body as the site of personal investigation, I explore the physical manifestations of denial, shame, and oppression. Moreover, issues surrounding the female body are examined. In particular, I share my own experiences as a young woman raised in the religious South. I am interested in addressing my own concerns with beauty, desire, vulnerability and imperfection. In my newly produced body of work, I continues this investigation yet the focus has become not only that of the aesthetic but that of the process— technique, pattern, place and content, and the historical made contemporary. The artist book, Remorse, is bound as a girdle book due to its intimate orientation to the body hidden under garments. The girdle binding, instituted in formats used by monks, is reintroduced as the concealed and close-to-the-flesh orientation of its form aligns with the subject matter and concept of this piece. Additionally, the length and weight of the book conceptually address the weight of the guilt carried by an individual.
The artist books Grievous Injuries and Enfold are composed of handmade paper made from the cotton fibers of corporal and purificators— cloths used in the Catholic Communion Ceremony to cover the blood and the body. Turning each page, the viewer turns back the cloth/the veil revealing images and text. Here the process is the concept. There is meaning in the making—the cutting up of each cloth, the hours of beating this cloth until it becomes pulp in which to form sheets. Each of the processes of papermaking, bookbinding and letterpress printing articulates its own voice on various visual levels but in combination, the techniques create conceptual forms that exhibit layered and veiled meanings. Additionally, the technical interconnectivity, as exemplified in the linear production of multiples, recalls the repetition of the soul’s silent and controlled voice seeking resolution.
The artist books Grievous Injuries and Enfold are composed of handmade paper made from the cotton fibers of corporal and purificators— cloths used in the Catholic Communion Ceremony to cover the blood and the body. Turning each page, the viewer turns back the cloth/the veil revealing images and text. Here the process is the concept. There is meaning in the making—the cutting up of each cloth, the hours of beating this cloth until it becomes pulp in which to form sheets. Each of the processes of papermaking, bookbinding and letterpress printing articulates its own voice on various visual levels but in combination, the techniques create conceptual forms that exhibit layered and veiled meanings. Additionally, the technical interconnectivity, as exemplified in the linear production of multiples, recalls the repetition of the soul’s silent and controlled voice seeking resolution.