Residencies
NIDO
Umbira, Italy
During the summer of 2022, I was invited to participate in The Poor Farm/Living in the Play residency organized by Michelle Grabner in Umbria, Italy. While there, I completed these works. Composite, undulating patterns made using screenprinting, paint, and colored pencil coalesce to create a conceptual reflection of time and space, a layered visual trope often seen in film and which intends to illustrate movement and energy on a two-dimensional surface.
Baroque Research Trip
France
In Summer 2017, I spent two weeks at Chateau Orquevaux in Champagne-Ardenne, France. While there, I completed these works. The intricate miniatures reflect my first attempts to incorporate Europe’s Colonial history into my work. The gold paint is specifically French, and is the same gold color seen all over Paris. The farm animals were, at first, an homage to my new feathered and furry friends, but they were also foreshadowing to more recent work that uses animals as a main subject.
All completed on a two-week residency in Champagne-Ardenne, these Miniature Paintings are the result of Baroque Research Trip.
TJ in CHINA Project Space
Tijuana, Mexico
In 2013 I spent three weeks in Tijuana, Baja California, Mexico at the TJinCHINA Project Space- I got to know Tijuana as a pedestrian with my family. With our son (3 years old at the time) in a stroller, my husband and I walked the streets of TJ, a city not known for “walkability”, gathering information and photographic material for this work. While sometimes challenging (due to high curbs and sometimes-missing-walks) moving through the city in this way provided us the source material for mixed-media city-scapes. A “shop” was created using very basic materials in the TJINCHINA project space. The color palette, influenced by TJ, uses primarily Politec and Comex paints. The green and neon orange are colors that not only repeat themselves throughout the city (and are politically coded) also refer to the Mexican flag. Color fades with spray paint create quasi-sunsets and sunrises over the hills of Baja California.
Issues related to Tijuana’s status as a border city with the U.S. struck us upon their first visit to the Border Fence at Playas de Tijuana; while ubiquitous to Tijuanese, we felt culpable for it as U.S. citizens/taxpayers and embarrassed at not really understanding that this structure has been in place for many years.
Grafikwerkstatt
Dresden, Germany
In 2011, the Ohio Arts Council and Zygote Press sent me to Dresden to participate in the long-running residency exchange with the Grafikwerkstatt. Upon arrival, I began a 90 centimeter zinc intaglio plate, working both sides - one side based on the Frauenkirche, the city's most recognizable landmark and the back based upon the Albertbrucke (the bridge where the weekly Fleamarket is held each Saturday). I responded to the city as a guest. Many of the titles are a combination of German, French and English words, reflecting my linguistic confusion. The intaglios characterize Dresden as repeated iconic buildings dotted with 17th century stone figures from the city’s Palace and are a response to the firebombing. The photo lithographs incorporate the shop’s collection of letterpress cuts that almost one for one reflected the weekly flea market offerings.
Work Party 118, SpaceLab
SPACES, Cleveland
Rebirth here, in MidTown, has taken shape in weeds and trash. Work Party 118 was influenced by what we leave behind and how we value place, combining screen-printing, drawing, found objects, painting, cotton ribbon and 8 inches of snow. There is energy in these lots; the tension and excitement of being here has to do with the vibrancy of this neighborhood in the past and wishing more was happening here now. But life goes on in these lots and things are getting better. SPECIAL THANKS to the 40 Volunteers and MidTown, Inc. CDC who made Work Party 118 a great success!
