Born to Be
Maker, Creator, Teacher
I began my art practice as a child and always found myself drawn to creating and making with many different mediums, the earliest being abstracts with oil pastel, pencil sketches, eventually evolving into grid drawing for realism, abstract painting, sharpie doodling, sculpture, silk-screening, etc.
In my adolescence, I found comfort and solace in art and writing. By the time I was 20, I had a rather telling collection of poems that helped me express my achey emotional self as I learned to navigate life. I still own the battered thesaurus I kept at hand whenever the mood to write struck me.
I earned a B.A. B.Ed. from the University of Lethbridge in 2009 and have now been an art teacher for almost 15 years, fostering creative curiosity and passion in our next generation, while also dabbling in my own art practice. I love collaboration and find myself ever-busy with creative projects.
For years, my well being has been sustained by creativity, and I want to share my practices and this body of work with others who may share my vision.
My own creative practice is most often inspired by nature, colour theory, abstract expressionism, doodling, and wonderings about what it means to be human.
I am often left surprised by the way creativity is simultaneously captivating, symbiotic, and lively with authentic expression.
Flow Mediums
I feel connected when working with paper, print, pencil, paint, sharpie, photo, collage, and sculpture. Mixing media is one of my favourite practices for art-making.
My education as a student and experience as a teacher has allowed me to develop my flow most easily in drawing with sharpie or enjoying the visual bliss of mixed colour.
To the right are the sharpie drawings that I did with my partner. His drawing ended up more fluid, colourful, and smoothly drawn, while mine is more jagged and sharp, evoking an interesting contrast in style.
My art practice reflects my random abstract nature, so my best work is usually freely expressive without limitations. Often, I like to skip the pencil and start with sharpie, or pull out a canvas and paint on the floor like Pollock. Sometimes skin is my canvas of choice. Other times, I like burying words in doodles and zentangles. I truly enjoy whatever artistic impulse gets my creative juices flowing!
When I enter my state of flow, I play around with the intricate complexities of elements and principles of art and design, suddenly enraptured by the process. The art I create embodies that playful way of making and creating, keeping me feeling young at heart and bringing me back to the studio again and again.
Inspiration
My earliest inspiration came from artists like M.C. Escher and Kandinsky, and I resonate with the work of Frida Kahlo, Banksy, and Salvador Dali, but nature has always been the highest source of creative energy in my life.
Nature's profound symmetry, mesmerizing movement, glorious splendor, and captivating contrast keep my creative engine inspired with perfect, chaotic abstraction. I have developed a keen sense of organic forms, expressive colour mixing, and meandering, flowing movement in my art-making. My practice continues to grow and evolve.
My partner brings into my life an entirely new form of work, and his resonance with sacred geometry melded with my abstract expressionist vibration inspires our blended practice, together building a meaningful lifestyle and memorable body of work.
Thank you for your presence here to witness for us and for believing in creating and making this life the best it can be.
To the left was a photograph I captured of a leaf with three water droplets on it, left behind by a storm the night before. In a video I took, you can see water swirling inside each droplet and a different colour refracted back through the light. Exquisitely natural, not AI.