ABOUT: My practice investigates play, perception and humor as pathways of resilience through crisis. A consistent exploration in my work is the therapeutic role of cartoons in assimilating psychologically complex experiences.
The immediacy of drawing enables slippages between my self, material and symbol, manifesting residues from the interior and transformative realm of the imagined. By giving linework objecthood, the emotional states that carried me through difficult experiences, such as hope and vulnerability, can be transmuted into permanent emotional catalysts and living symbols.
Broadly, I am interested in the interplay of and dissolution between objects, symbols, icons, emotions, and the illusory binaries underpinning culture. As I become a more experienced steward of my own mental health diagnosis, I’ve become increasingly invested in matters of ecology and interspecies harm reduction.
BIO: I am a second generation Polish-Irish American raised and based in Chicago. I am a current MFA candidate at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and received a BFA with honors from the New York State College of Ceramics at Alfred University (2017.)
Since 2019, I have worked in public service administration and community engagement, where I coordinate arts programming for Chicago youth in the Teen Services & YOUmedia department at Chicago Public Library. Projects I have helped develop and continuously support include Teen Winter Challenge, an all-city arts competition and Radical Fit, a fashion-based program series for queer youth.