The Shell Series
Shells are fragments of protection—once inhabited, now emptied—yet still bearing the memory of life. In The Shell Series, I use these forms to explore the emotional residue of illness, vulnerability, and endurance. Created while undergoing treatment for breast cancer, each piece is both a meditation and a refusal: a meditation on fragility, and a refusal to disappear into it.
I work across drawing and painting, shifting mediums in tandem with my physical capacity. When energy wanes, pencil drawings emerge—quiet and precise, grounded in introspection. In moments of strength, textured paintings allow for more visceral engagement: layers of plaster, charcoal, pastel, and medium build surfaces that echo scar tissue, sediment, and time.
These shells are not decorative. They are anatomical, psychological, and symbolic—holding space for absence, grief, transformation, and hope. Some are cracked or hollow; others pulse with energy or fragment under pressure. Together, they form a language of survival—personal and universal, silent and unflinching.