Artist Statement
The internal characteristics of art lie in everyone. We weave together the world that we live in and create our life. My artistic practice is centered on unfolding my own artistic characteristics. For me wearing a hat is a reminder and an expression of this practice.
In the series Worlds in your Head, I was often thinking about the duality of art and the everyday and how to connect the two. To highlight this relationship I was interested in exploring the transformation of sculpture to hat, and hat to sculpture. Through the experimentation of carving foam and painting with hand dyed felt, bold colors arch over form to create abstractions and worlds within the hat. The hats act as soft containers for the ideas that allow us to escape into abstraction, and for the ideas that bring out our inherent artistic characteristics.
The second series is made from textiles that I find or create. The expression of the fabric is indicative to the idea behind each piece. The elements in these hats feel historically familiar, or perhaps like a costume piece. However, these hats are meant for the everyday through the combination of costume and street wear.
Hat-Opolis was exhibited at ArtPrize 10 2018 in Grand Rapids, MI
