◆ Artist Statement ◆

 I’ve always been interested in interactions between humanity and interactions between the audience and my art. Portraiture is rooted in controlled interactions, what is seen is a calculated representation of the subject. I’m intrigued by the opposite, the overlooked and unmade-up moments that are revealed behind the mask of a portrait. 

The ideas of makeup, contemporary beauty, and public and private identity are currently driving my work. Make-up is so synonymous with the masking of identity. However, there’s an agency in drawing attention to that mask; an act of reclaiming those synonymous stereotypes. My work is dramatic and highly saturated, it confronts make-up and the figure head-on in an often scary and theatrical way. I reclaim the makeup through its emphasis on color and material. I reveal the unmade-up through layers of production. I bring the viewer into an intimate space, both in a cropped zoomed figure and physical space of the installation, showing them both the physical and metaphorical production of painting a face.