I find myself relating to the pests of suburbia - the opossum, the honeysuckle, the starling. The Birds Know is a series of quilted portraits of Kalamazoo, focusing on how our community encounters the intersecting needs of architecture, animals, and people. I am interested in evoking nostalgia connected to a familiar and yet unknown place - working from contemporary and historic buildings in kalamazoo, I have references photographs, archival images, and on sight paintings. I draw from life in my sketchbook and I layer my experience and my imagination until they are indistinguishable. I am creating scenes to highlight the ephemeral qualities of our community and lean into the feeling of stepping into a painting, a comic, or a dream.
