My work explores this idea: the way perception alters the places where we find ourselves alone, and how objects and shadows become characters we must face. With pastel as my primary medium, I deconstruct color to harness its psychological power, focusing on my feeling of a space rather than strict naturalism. White sheets become a river of green, purple, and gold, activated not just by the color but by the texture and energy of the mark.

In these decisions, I look to Edvard Munch, who created psychologically charged space with unexpected color and bold strokes. I try to bring some of his unapologetic world-building and experimentation into my own studio. By so doing, I hope to enliven familiar spaces and reveal the possibilities that lie in wait for us there.

I am fascinated by the shadows we cast, the dark extensions of ourselves that follow us wherever we go. In my work, I twist them into unnatural beings that might reveal something about the “main” subjects that they may not know about themselves. Perhaps, like Jekyll and Hyde, the shadow is the antithesis of the figure. Perhaps, like Peter Pan, the shadow, embodies a more extreme version of the figure. Or perhaps our shadows can take on lives of their own, looming over us in the darkness even after we turn on the light.