Ridgewood Open Studios 2026
Arriving at the studio means entering a particular kind of creative noise. To my right, a neighbor's sewing machine hums throughout the morning. A few doors down, I'll often hear a woman singing over a track as a producer mixes a new pop song. And above me, actors rehearse Shakespeare, for what I imagine is a casting directors’ latest vision.
Earlier this month, the visual artists of the building had an opportunity to welcome guests from the Ridgewood community (and I had a chance to actually meet my neighbors).
As for my studio? I turned the space into a small gallery, hanging a lot of work that lived in sketchbooks or tucked away from view until now. Each wall represented a different chapter of my art practice, beginning several years ago and moving towards the present.
In Spring of 2020, I restarted a latent drawing practice, spending time each evening to experiment for several hours after a full day’s work. I had just moved into my first solo apartment a few months prior to lockdown––let’s just say the pandemic was not exactly the type of solitude I thought I was signing up for.
But I feel grateful for the opportunity to this day. My apartment became a sanctuary for my creative practice, and interiors became a ready subject. Experimenting with materials, I took pleasure in laying down messy oils and drawing back into it with colored pencil or graphite to indulge in drawing’s immediacy.
Love Made Hungry, drawings and studies in oil pastel, charcoal on paper, 2020.
By the spring of 2023, I was often traveling between Oakland, California, and my home in New York. Often in flight, I found myself working most often in a sketchbook, a way to take my art practice with me. I limited my materials to India ink and pencil on paper, keeping it simple enough to pack. While assembling this installation for the open studios, I was surprised to learn how much my color palette had changed in those few years.
Drawings in ink and graphite from 2023-present.
See more of these works on paper in the portfolio section of this site.
In 2023, I started a painting series, love is a force of nature. Drawing upon inspiration from Homer’s Hymn to Demeter, Ovid’s Metamorphosis and fifteen years of diaries, I began constructing a re-narration of Persephone’s abduction to the underworld. It’s an allegory for the seasons, a story about rising after death, and the life force that is indestructible.
Pomegranates, as a subject, were the entry point: like Eve’s apple, they represent temptation, a threshold moment to the before and after. The spirit of these paintings called for an approach that was deeply seductive; I was drawn to the dark pigments that only oil paint can really capture.
Spoils, oil on panel, 2023.
So after many years drawing in an immediate, intentionally raw visual language (prioritizing gesture and instinct over technical polish) I returned to traditional painting techniques I first learned in high school. As an experiment, I wanted to see what I remembered about traditional representational art.
A mind-map of poetry, visual ideas and Demeter’s mythic narrative.
In the years since beginning the project, I’ve assemble scores of research, found images, and created a wealth of experimental studies. With the studio as a resource, I’m excited to turn my attention back to experimentation, bringing the series out of my imagination and into life.
