Artist Statement

Judge not according to the appearance, but judge righteous judgment. (John 7:24)

The works included in Genius Species present my personal exploration into the complexity of conformity – how it shapes us, our way of seeing, and ultimately, how rejection (or acceptance) is always primarily reflection. 

The act of truly looking at a person or place, is both an act of love and defiance. To refuse to look down or look away – to immortalize what I see through art making is to assert the validity of my lens. The outlier perspective of “the minority” necessarily adds to and distorts the view of the whole. Rendering a single composite image is, in some ways, an attempt to reconcile the asymmetry and inherent contradictions of experience.  It is the desire to rest on a truth. I want to be able to remember it the way it truly was – 

​