Oil on Linen, 20x20, $6,800, Available to Purchase

“I’m still here” is kind of the start of this entire IAL project for me. I began doing these floral pieces where the life blooms out of an abstracts sort of chaos which has its own aesthetic beauty. It symbolizes the parts of the human story that aren’t often told or hide behind shame. It’s what makes us human, but can be the things we don’t want to show the world. The flowers themselves represent life and the blooming beautiful quality of it and the parts that are often scene. I painted it in response to losing someone very close in my life. A sort of spiritual mentor of mine lost her life due to depression. This was a person who endured some of the hardest experiences in their life and weathered all sorts of unfathomable obstacles.  Nancy was one of the greatest encouragements in my life and continued to be even after her death, helping me to overcome my own struggles with anxiety and depression. I think of her often and can still feel her presence in the beauty of these floral paintings. We never know what is not stated in one’s life; the things they have endured and keep hidden. She taught me to always have so much compassion for people because you don’t always see what they’ve lived through. We can enjoy and be in awe of what is presented on the outside, yet we can also be attuned to see the invisible and celebrate the beauty of it all. The agony and the ecstasy. I want to make art that helps people feel more connected, less alone and more observant of beauty to ease some bit of human suffering.