Then, There is a Thesis...

Fairy tales, biblical stories, and folk narratives inform both my female

identity and the conceptual underpinning of my sculpture. I insert personal

biases, memories, hopes, and fears into my work in order to satirize and expose

cultural assumptions about gender, sexuality, and power. To this end, I make my

sculptural work from quotidian objects that reference the visual language of my

late-twentieth century Midwestern childhood. Dollhouse furniture. A bedpost.

China cabinet. I manipulate these found objects in order to question their original

purpose and the narratives they remind me of and to confront my own

ambivalence toward power and commodified desire.

The implicit suggestion of a happy ending in everyday American

experience is suggested in retirement ads, children’s toys and clothing, television

shows and movies. Disney regularly comes out with new princesses and

remakes the old, drawing in old and new audiences alike and recreates

believable versions of “Once Upon A Time” that become harder and harder to

separate from reality. My work is suspended in this tension. These narratives are

embedded with my hopes and fears. On one hand: a rescue, a prince, a castle,

and children. On the other: dependence, betrayal, abandonment, poverty, and

eternal damnation.