Date of Submission

Spring 2024

Academic Program

Studio Arts

Project Advisor 1

Beka Goedde

Abstract/Artist's Statement

I am a very sentimental person. I have always had an attachment to things. Things being anything and everything from antique boxes to clay figurines I made when I was six. The list goes on. Each object is an embodiment of a feeling, and I desperately hold on to these “things” (despite others’ disapproval) because I am afraid to let go and forget that feeling. Whether that feeling is shame or pure joy, I have a hard time letting go. As I have gotten older and taken a harder look at my things, I see a complex timeline of my youth and how I felt moment to moment, year to year. Objects become symbols, ordinary images become suggestive.

My paintings are nostalgic because I am nostalgic. I look back on my childhood and am filled with gratitude. I also now recognize the struggles I faced as a young girl and how they began to puncture the childhood my parents gave me. Part of this process was the clash between the sweetness of my childhood with the often shameful experiences of my adolescence.

While I played with my dolls and read bedtime stories, I also was exposed to things that didn’t feel so childlike. The line between woman and girl was constantly blurred, and I didn’t know what side of the line I wanted to fall on. There was an entire adult world I was fascinated by that I simultaneously was and was not allowed to participate in.

In my paintings I cling to whimsy. What allowed me to communicate with my stuffed animals at eleven years old is what permeates my paintings today. Talking animals and dreamlike settings guided me through this series of paintings.

I see these paintings as depicting a portrait of myself as much as the world I live in. When planning my paintings, I use digital collage to combine images from a variety of sources into a basic composition. Then I proceed to paint using my imagination to transform the source images into a cohesive whole.

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