Artist Statement

Called to action by the gravity of current events and their historical context, I play with cultural icons varying from material objects such as genie bottles and magic carpets to celebrity figures like Saddam Hussein and Martha Stewart. Although they inevitably fail to illustrate larger, differential concepts, pop icons offer access to a vernacular understanding of the world. By seizing the pleasure of mythology and using it proactively, I hope to resist the oversimplification of ideas that such fantasies have come to represent. I have performed as a quack doctor and impersonated a private investigator as a way to ask strangers to share their stories and idiosyncrasies with me. I inhabit characters inspired by existing stereotypes such as the fortune teller/mystic or the romantic image of the early American colonist. Creating an absurd interactive scenario for the audience through these personas is a tactic I use to investigate what people know and how they've come to feel comfortable with their own versions of the truth.