Ojo Ancestral, 2020

I investigate the intersections between land, family, home, and community. I grapple with questions about human connectedness while trekking remote parts of our natural world. Investigating the spiritual connections between wild terrains and our corporal bodies opens my periphery about our universe. Nature embodies coexistence; it eliminates the barriers of division fabricated by our present-day society. In search for unification, I venture through textiles- a universal language in all the cultures of the world. I am interested in the healing benefits of these art making processes, evident in the research of expressive arts therapists, clinical psychologists, and writers. My process consists of photographing textures found in the wilderness as a way to document the impermanence of nature. I read these textures I document as a form of text- wild, free and evolving. Utilizing various kinds of natural and manmade fibers, I transcribe these texts into relief sculptural “paintings.” I draw, collage and use thread to veil objects with color. I innovate ways of interacting with materials by dancing, patting or tightening surfaces to create representational and non-representational imagery. While the materials are soft, flexible, or fluid in their raw form, they appear frozen and permanent. I hold movement in place so it becomes motionless, so it documents the undocumented.