I was born and raised in Philadelphia, and received my BFA from the Kansas City Art Institute, where I studied painting. I believe that being a native and resident of Philadelphia has contributed to my fascination in the beauty of imperfection, humility, and humanism. I collect discarded family photography, forgotten books, and eroded objects, utilizing these as subject matter in my work. I am fascinated by the definitive qualities in the images people have weeded out and the nostalgia in the captured moments of awkwardness of strangers. My work explores a photograph as an anthropological document as well as a scientific specimen, containing information about the historical chemistry of photography and processes of decay. Through painting and drafting, I draw parallels between natural processes and man-made constructions, revealed through faded specimens of displaced human rituals and dated interpretations of the natural, physical world. I have always found that life’s greatest beauty is in its simultaneous strangeness and familiarity, in the struggle to comprehend and connect and the unpredictable and ephemeral moments in which this is achieved.

Through teaching and collaborative work, I further explore aspects of the human condition and encourage communication between cross-cultural groups.