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Scars are something of an anomaly inherent to the skin, a remnant. When the skin is torn, it can mend itself.  The initial tear changes it, but the wound is no longer vulnerable to infection. Once a person has been hurt emotionally, they mend the broken parts with a scar of sorts. We model our understanding of emotions after our understanding of skin. Because the skin is such an emotionally charged site, prone to understanding the presence of another person, I have begun to understand it as the place where relationships are felt. With my current body of work, I am exploring the idea of intimate relationships through skin: the skin of a structure, the skin of a body, the skin of a layered situation.

 

Remnants can be a beautiful thing, like resilience, the remnants signify survival, adaptation in the pursuit of life. I am reminded of the oyster's pearl. A grain of sand becomes trapped within, cutting, tearing, causing trauma. The oyster cannot expel the foreign agent, so it adapts. The oyster coats the pebble in pearl in an effort to smooth that which causes it discomfort. Layer upon layer is built up to protect the oyster. The solution is so simple and delicately portrayed. This example supports the notion that trauma, through the relationship of one thing to another, can produce remnants within the whole that elevate the original organism beyond itself. A scar is to skin as a pebble is to pearl. The forms you see embedded in my work are in relationship to one another. Through tension and proximity they begin to inform one another sometimes literally by sculpting each other’s collapse.  The relationship of these foreign forms begins to tell a store of strange but intimate communication.