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Hello and welcome! I am a multi-disciplined artist from New York City, with a background in sculptural and functional woodworking.
I graduated from Macalester College in 2018 with a major in Studio Art and a minor in Environmental Studies. During college, I studied abroad at SACI College of Art and Design in Florence, Italy where I completed an illustration internship at the local social justice-oriented publishing house, Libri Liberi. My senior year, I developed a strong interest in woodworking. I dedicated my thesis project to woodcarving, and spent three months creating a figurative sculpture which supported my graduation, Magna Cum Laude, and my reception of a Distinguished Merit Award for comprehensive achievement in Studio Art. After graduating, I studied at the Center for Furniture Craftsmanship in order to improve the precision of my work and develop my 3D design skills. There, I began focusing on furniture and how the specific function of a piece can be drawn out through its design. I continued to explore this concept while interning at Anderson Ranch Arts Center during the summer of 2019. In addition to maintaining the machines and assisting with workshops, I furthered my personal work, particularly through the exploration of segmented pattern making. After spending a year in Juneau Alaska, I relocated to New England, and am currently working out of a studio in Little Compton, RI. |
Artist Statement
I grew up in a New York City apartment, surrounded by concrete and steel. Perhaps because of this, I have always prioritized the presence of green spaces in my life, while also considering and questioning the boundaries we draw between nature and society. The binary of “natural” vs. “manmade” so often defines how we engage with our environment, whether it is through attempting to control it or romanticizing it.
In working with wood, I am consistently confronting this dichotomy. Each board’s inconsistencies and individuality necessitate developing an intimacy with the wood, as I shape it into something new. These qualities also ensure it is impossible to forget that what is now a board, was once a living tree.
Simultaneously dominating the material and revering its beauty creates an interesting tension, which I react to through my functional work. My designs directly reference the form of plants and have drawn inspiration from Karl Blossfeldt’s photographs of buds and leaves. I use this biological aesthetic to both distort and define the line between each piece’s newly human function and its indelible identity as a plant.
Working with wood has emboldened my art and empowered me as an individual in multiple ways. Through my sculptural work, I address my experience with trauma and the complexities of privately harboring and publicly sharing its emotional reverberations. Ultimately, I seek to call attention to the implications of relying on individual trauma to catalyze social change, a practice that places the burden of vulnerability on the survivor and leaves them open to emotional voyeurism.
In working with wood, I am consistently confronting this dichotomy. Each board’s inconsistencies and individuality necessitate developing an intimacy with the wood, as I shape it into something new. These qualities also ensure it is impossible to forget that what is now a board, was once a living tree.
Simultaneously dominating the material and revering its beauty creates an interesting tension, which I react to through my functional work. My designs directly reference the form of plants and have drawn inspiration from Karl Blossfeldt’s photographs of buds and leaves. I use this biological aesthetic to both distort and define the line between each piece’s newly human function and its indelible identity as a plant.
Working with wood has emboldened my art and empowered me as an individual in multiple ways. Through my sculptural work, I address my experience with trauma and the complexities of privately harboring and publicly sharing its emotional reverberations. Ultimately, I seek to call attention to the implications of relying on individual trauma to catalyze social change, a practice that places the burden of vulnerability on the survivor and leaves them open to emotional voyeurism.
EDUCATION
EXHIBITIONS
SCHOLARSHIPS AND AWARDS
PUBLISHED WORK
- Macalester College, St. Paul, MN — B.A. in Studio Art, 2018. Graduated Magna Cum Laude. Dean’s List, all semesters.
- SACI College of Art and Design, Florence, Italy — Undergraduate Studies, Fall 2016.
- Center for Furniture Craftsmanship, Rockport, ME — Furniture Intensive Program, Winter 2019.
EXHIBITIONS
- Concurrence, Center for Maine Contemporary Art, Rockport ME, 2021.
- Alumni & Fellows, 2021, Messler Gallery at the Center for Furniture Craftsmanship, Rockport ME, 2021.
- We All Belong, Gallery Undercroft, New York City NY, 2019.
- Interim, Patton-Malott Gallery at Anderson Ranch Arts Center, Snowmass Village CO, 2019.
- Bitchin*, Macalester College Senior Art Exhibition, Law Warschaw Gallery, St. Paul MN, 2018.
- Macalester Juried Student Art Show, Law Warschaw Gallery, St. Paul MN, 2015-2018.
- SACI Juried Student Art Show, Jules Maidoff Gallery, Florence, Italy, 2016.
SCHOLARSHIPS AND AWARDS
- Dewitt Wallace Distinguished Scholarship, Merit based, Macalester College, 2014-2018.
- Distinguished Merit Award in Studio Art, Awarded for Comprehensive Achievement in Studio Art, Macalester College, 2018.
- Macalester Juried Student Art Show, Honorable Mention, 2015 and 2018.
PUBLISHED WORK
- Promotional Facebook Banners, Libri Liberi Editore, Florence, Italy, Fall 2016.
- Anonymous, Print of the Week in The Mac Weekly, October, 2015.
- “The Shifting Mandala”, Lead op-ed piece in the New York Times, Sept. 28, 2013.