As an extreme introvert with a child-like imagination and an obsession with animals, I learned to escape into a world of my own creation where stuffed animals and model horses came alive. This animal obsession began in childhood when I started drawing and riding horses, and continued when I studied zoology and veterinary medicine in college.
My anthropomorphized animal portraits show animals typing, texting, and taking selfies at their zoom room workspaces. Superficially, these sweet and funny animal portraits seem to be wrapped in a pink and blue sugar coating of childhood innocence, introversion, and shyness. Underneath that protective candy coating, however, an imagination is running wild, using animal adaptations in a message of the importance of species conservation and nonconformity. Created using thick, unapologetically raw, visceral brushstrokes that you can feel, my paintings demonstrate the process of creation, including the mistakes and unblended layers of thick paint.
My art combines the aesthetics of Japanese Kawaii pop culture into the mystery and satire of Alfred Hitchcock.
First, it makes you smile, but then it makes you think.