"Cruelty and aggression are always there, but they can be transformed into things that are beautiful and sublime." - J. Derrida

We live in a culture where the capacity for cruelty and aggression are played out in worlds we believe to be outside or beyond our immediate selves - war, politics, cinema, advertising, art, and music. However, these institutions reveal the inner contradictions of our society that many of us are oblivious to or cannot bare digesting directly.

Transforming our hidden paradox into visual metaphors or environments of sublime and transcendental beauty is one way to negotiate the complexity of our human state. My work is derived by exploring and creating such worlds in order to intimately understand human nature and create an exquisite experience of it.

My academic background in the arts focused on race, class, and gender and then more closely on the emergence of technology as a means for liberation and equality. These themes run silently through my work as I look for signifiers that form the macro narrative. By re-appropriating the fragments I attempt to intercept patterns of indifference by creating alternate worlds that transgress or transcend one’s experience.

A few years ago, I created a series exploring the sublime act of repetition and control within an environment of unpredictability. The aggressive act of throwing paint randomly onto a surface is balanced with the intimate outlining of each twist and turn of splattered pigment. The process is laborious and ultimately transforms the chaotic shapes into beautifully rendered viral patterns. This series, STREAMLINE, has been created on various media including installation.

Currently, I’m developing mixed media collage which stands in contrast to the quiet, reflective qualities of STREAMLINE, embracing instead the disturbing and transgressive side of beauty. It is an external application of Derrida’s concept whereas STREAMLINE is an internal solution. These works were born from the inspiration in Goya’s representation of, “The Sleep of Reason Breeds Monsters.” Whereas Goya presents his monsters as the ephemeral realm of sinister ideas; this interpretation explores a conceptualized materialization of a sleeping culture.

The female iconic figures are mutated into transcendental monsters. The frightful yet beautiful forms express the hidden essence of today’s warriors surviving amidst dormant logic and emotion. Eyes have been removed, limbs missing, and body parts replaced by material fragments of an aggressive and consumer-driven society, and her identity stolen. Even under such extreme circumstances, however; these heroines emit a sense of entitlement, poise, and strength. They are not to be defeated but instead adjust to the environmental demands and remain in tact even if by seemingly fragile or explosive threads.

Created by deconstructing images from popular magazines and combining them with drawings, a fictional universe emerges where we are subjected to the cruel process of disfiguration that redefines the essence of beauty and strength through adaptation and resilience.