Produce, oil on canvas, 50 x 36 inches

The Culture Corset series explores the tension between individual identity and societal expectations.  I am particularly focused on this disharmony between the individual and society as it relates to women, the female body, female sexuality, and gender identity.  My images dissect society's paradoxical relationship with women and their bodies.  My paintings examine American culture's simultaneous obsession with the female body and sexuality and its Puritanical attitudes toward sex and repulsion with the female body the way it naturally is.

The individuals in my paintings appear alone and on display as they navigate the gulf between "I am" and "I should be."  The paint is applied with an attention to anatomical detail that both celebrates women's bodies and references the leering voyeurism and minutely critical gaze that the female body encounters.  Words occasionally enter the composition to label or describe, giving the voice of society a literal, physical presence in the work.  Stamps, handmade stencils, repetitive patterns, and product placement harvest popular images and attitudes from our culture.

Ultimately, my work is about the threat of the Other appropriating the Self.  The struggle between defining oneself and internalizing the definition provided by society and its participants plays out in the territory of the body.  At its core, though, it is a psychological conflict.  The individuals in my paintings internalize society’s definition of them, react to it, or hover somewhere in the middle.  My paintings use images of the physical body to explore this psychological tension. In keeping with the concept of appropriation, I ironically utilize an old masters’ style which primarily men have used to paint their female subjects throughout art history.  This style allows me to explore the concept of appropriation stylistically as well as thematically.