Last July/August I stumbled across a new technique while trying to figure out alcohol inks on yupo paper. While trying to move the inks around the paper with a heat gun, the paper began to melt. I got frustrated and threw the slightly crinkled piece of paper aside, thinking nothing of it.
Then one day, I got angry. Just PURE f*cking angry. Why? Cause human beings can be really cruel and mean and I.WAS.PISSED. Which equates in my head to "DAMN IT, I want to burn something!"
In that moment, on the floor was that warped piece of yupo I messed up weeks before. Another screw up, in my mind, something else to just annoy me. So I picked up my hand butane torch, that I use for my resin art, and started burning the yupo paper, thinking nothing of it, except "don't burn the house down".
In those moments, something fascinating started to form, these beautiful melted, deformed shapes. Then there they stayed, on my desk for a few weeks, until another day I got pissed... And I thought "what can I do with you?"
Oh what I did with them!
"The Ice Queen's Heart" was formed. My first "heart". My nickname for so long. The Ice Queen. It fell into place. The layers just fit together perfectly, as if they were meant to be in that form, always.
Others followed... "Meta", "Steampunk...", "Purple Heart", "The Promise of Moriches", "Sacred Heart", "A Mother's Nature"......they wouldn't stop...
I became obsessed. Trying different methods, different tools, but each piece ended up representing a person, a feeling, a memory - a part of me. A version of my heart coming into artform.
All these memories I would have, these feelings I couldn't express, were all coming into something tangible. I would finish a new piece, and would just stare at it, almost breathless, as if I had just ripped my own heart out of my chest cavity.
This Thursday, I will be previewing two new "hearts" at a group art show in Tribeca. Two of My hearts will be on display, in public... that thought is mortifying.
What is even more terrifying is that this is a preview of what is to come. See I have been working on a series of 24 hearts for an exhibition that is set to open in April at the same gallery.
24 Hearts - each one deeply personal, each one holding a profound memory/feeling.
The idea of being so open and vulnerable in a sea of strangers, is terrifying. I keep trying to talk myself out of showing, daily. Who am I kidding, I am currently trying to talk myself out of the group show this Thursday and I type this! hahaha
I adore these pieces, more than anything else I have ever created in my entire life. They are so incredibly special to me, and they can never be replicated. No two are the same.
The good, the bad, the ... well everything...
My hearts....