My work explores perception and presence: I use figurative portraits of the female body not only to better understand the conflicting pressures that have long been imposed on women, but also live with those tensions in myself. The relationships between the real and the ideal, the viewer and the viewed, self-consciousness and inhibition, public consumption and privacy, obligation and intuition are embodied in the vessel in which I live and through which I paint.

I paint nude portraits of others, but in doing so I, too, feel raw and naked. By observing the bodies of others, I learn to live more fully in my own, and find my gaze turning inward. Where I once observed emotional intimacy in female relationships, I am now drawn to unearthing my own internal worlds, making sense of them through paint.

Through revisiting the same themes again and again, how can the work become sharper and more honest? I think of going deeper, not broader, and how the strangest creatures live in the deepest parts of the ocean. The natural landscape is a source of inspiration, running as an undercurrent through my work, its elements lending themselves to emotional expression; anxiety in the wind, security in a solid rock face.

My work dwells in uncertainty, ambiguity, and paradox. There is no resolution—only continued exploration and deepening acceptance. Pithy conclusions and simple messages are not the goal: rather, I spend time in the layered, complex spaces between outward presentation and inner life. Through my work, I learn that exposure can be a form of shelter, and in the grey areas of life, one can find a place of solace.