I am fascinated by the processes of perception and the necessity of constructing models in order to conceptualize a multitude of complex stimuli. I am interested in how these models are internalized, how they overlap, how they are limited, and the ways in which they break down. It seems that, short of any complete understanding of the reality of a subject, there is only an unending re-working of the models that describe it. I am both terrified and inspired by this, feeling the impossibility of believing in anything, but at the same time the need to believe in something.

Ultimately, this is tied to the postulation of utopias, apprehension about mortality, and an attempt to identify other, more complete ways of being, or at least the limitations of current practices and their logical implications. These tendencies oscillate between dream and nightmare, hope and despair, critique and blind acceptance. They are often unstable and contradictory, yet they also seem to be a fundamental part of our very existence. I am intrigued by what happens when this drive toward a better life meets its material analog, when, for better or worse, utopian ideals are shifted by the complexity of primary sensual experience.

My current artistic research focuses on this conceptualization of physical reality as it is articulated in contemporary scientific thought. I am particularly interested in the areas of science that operate at the very edge of what is knowable and in the needed postulation of models that move from experiential, even mundane, existence to highly abstract, always fragmented conceptualizations of something believed to be fundamental. I want to emulate this conceptual movement in my artwork, starting from mundane or crude materials/objects, and attempting to realize a model or structure that is itself thought to underlie or even transcend materiality. As an artist, the ways in which these attempted realizations fail in my work are more interesting to me than any notion of potential success.

The use of electrical conduit and fluorescent tubes in past works is a reference to institutional and also industrial environments, which are the physical manifestations of the Utopian drive to overcome materiality. The colored fluorescent light implicates the viewer, making them aware that they are physically acclimating their perception to the space. The structures themselves often have an exuberance or over-articulation that begin to defy the mundane materials of their construction. I am interested in creating an ambiguity as to whether the dynamics of the structure communicate a sense of growth and expansion or entropy and deterioration, because I see this as underlying the apprehension that is felt about our abilities to even understand, let alone control or remake our environment.