Artist Statement

I create art in order to fulfill two opposing needs: to withdraw from the mundane tasks of daily life and commune with a higher realm, and to connect with the strange and beautiful nature of the world around me. In both these acts, I encounter myself. 

Through instant photography and the endless possibilities of emulsion lifting, my work explores the ephemeral and the instantaneous: the immediate magic of now that disappears just as quickly as it arrives. None of these moments will ever return. I use my work to embrace the uncertainty of this moment, just before it changes into something else. Like waves or clouds, there’s a liquidity to living, an ongoing process of connection and change that I try to capture in its many different shapes and forms. 

I’m drawn to the hazy, vintage images produced by instant cameras, shooting whatever strikes me with my Polaroid SX70 or my Mint SLR670-S in both color and black and white. But the initial shot is just the beginning: I never know how the final image will turn out, and I’m usually surprised by the tiny mistakes and chemical changes that make each photo, like each moment, completely, beautifully unique. I often transfer imagery across several different media before the work is complete. 

Instant photography has taught me to examine the outside world alongside my own internal depths, to get comfortable in the ambiguity that hovers between. I see my work as an act of exploration, a process of finding and revealing hidden truths in the ambiguity of our fictions and dreams. I see life’s inescapable changes as opportunities: Why pretend like we know everything? What else is there that we can’t yet see?