My work is an attempt to organize a pantry of random, but interconnected, thoughts all concerning the marketing and consumption of products. These products might be physical goods, such as household products (Ivory soap, Kingsford charcoal or Clorox bleach), or food (Snack Cakes, sandwiches or various cuts of meat from your supermarket), or they might be something less tangible. A product can also be an idea, information or a service.
Currently, marketing and consumerism are viewed as necessary, or to some a completely unnecessary, evils. Consumerism is viewed as destructive and wasteful. And, marketing is seen as a tool utilized in “tricking” consumers into buying things they do not need, or things that may actually be bad for them. Whether this is true or false is not the concern of my work. It is instead to catalog and categorize. Each work is like a flash card with no answer. It is the viewer that must supply their own feelings, be they pleasure, disgust or indifference.
I primarily use embroidery, but have recently moved into needle felting, as well as, gouache and glitter on paper. The art world appears elitist to some, but craft, perhaps because it has been historically devalued as “women’s work,” offers a more democratic and approachable means of making and viewing art. Also, because it has been shunned for half a generation, it is seen as something new to our tech-saturated society that is starving for creative hand-made objects. Working with one’s hands is a slow, painstaking process that requires a kind patience that today’s society is unfamiliar with and flawed can be more perfect than perfection.