There's Nothing to Fear About a Ritual

I used to spend a great deal of time at the intersection of fear and art-making. My fear had nothing to do with making “bad” art, which is perhaps what is assumed artists fear the most. I was afraid of making art that was good yet overdone, limited, and uninspired. Whenever my work seemed to be doing this, I would often stop making art altogether.

Writing instructions began as a motivational tactic. Over time, they became integral to the evolution of my work – forcing me to value process over product, experimentation over rules, creation over analysis. Each text piece in this series is an instruction I wrote for myself: "Construct a landscape", "Intrude", "Tell unfinished stories". Each image is my interpretation and execution of those instructions.

During installation, I wrote a final instruction for the audience to better communicate this ritual. The piece titled "Place a photograph here" is a large mirror etched with the metering markings of a camera's viewfinder - encouraging viewers to take pictures of the mirror from any angle, thus placing their perspective on the gallery wall. This piece is ever-changing, so the project as a whole - much like the ritual itself - remains in a permanent state of development.