Visual Art

My work as a visual artist explores how we interpret our perceptions and how we create geographies of meaning based on those interpretations.

Imparting a visible form to these geographies is my primary endeavor. Each piece grows from an ongoing examination of how we choose to inquire into the many layers of existence and of how we make decisions in shaping our worlds. I place pieces together in specific sites to form constellations of objects, images, texts, videos and interactions.

Selected Exhibits and Projects 

2012    
For Speed Killed My Cousin , written and performed by The Carpetbag Theatre, I created a video installation to serve as the stage environment (see video excerpt and still images in gallery at right). Speed explores multiple issues related to war, including the history of otherness of African Americans in the military, the experiences of women in combat and the inter-generational impacts of Post-Traumatic Stress (PTS). The performance takes place almost entirely from the seats of a Humvee in a night drive along the Long Island Expressway. The challenge for me as an artist was to create a video installation that evokes a larger universe of spiritual and physical movement, questioning, revelation and reflection, in which the actors' journey can transpire. Speed Killed My Cousin was written by Linda Parris-Bailey for The Carpetbag Theatre.
Directed by Andrea Assaf. 

2009    
Here and Now  
Coordinator, Curator
(Group collaborative installation, catalog)
National Performance Network Annual Conference
Emporium Gallery
Knoxville, Tennessee    

2007-08
Environment: Common Good, Common Responsibility
(Group exhibit. catalog)
Foundation of Charles-Leopold Mayer
Paris, France
Oscar Araipe Foundation,
Minas Gerais, Brazil
Paraty House of Culture
Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
Annual Congress of
Greek Ecological Associations
Corfu, Greece

2003    
Trading Visions
(Two-person, collaborative installation)
Sponsored by the Tennessee Economic Renewal Network
and the Tennessee Arts Commission
Knoxville, Tennessee

2001-03    
Borderlands
(Group exhibit)
Khabarovsk Academy of Art
Khabarovsk, Russia
Center for the Visual Arts
Denver, Colorado
Glenwood Springs Center for the Arts
Glenwood Springs, Colorado      

Death Without Borders    
(Group exhibit) 
Teatro Jose Peon Contreras
Merida, Yucatan, Mexico
Givens Institute
Aspen, Colorado
Steam Plant
Salida, Colorado                         

2002    
SINAPSIS, 3rd Biennale Iberoamerican de Lima 
(Group exhibit)
Sponsored by the U.S. Embassy and the Escuela de Arte Corriente Alterna  
Galeria Corriente Alterna
Lima, Peru     

Art and Ecology: Mexican and American Perspectives, A Bi-National Exhibition
(Group exhibit)
Colorado Mountain College Center for Excellence in the Arts
Glenwood Springs, Colorado

Delegation to Mexico on Trade and Globalization
(Artist-Member)
Sponsored by the
Tennessee Economic Renewal Network

2001    
Art and Death
(Group exhibit)
Sala de Exposiciones, Casa Tlaxcala
Representaciones de Gobierno de Tlaxcala
Mexico City, Mexico

2000    
Little Boat, Big Water
(Solo exhibit)
Truman State University
Kirksville, Missouri

Approaches, Illuminations, Divides
Coordinating Artist and Presenter
(Group exhibit)
LatCrit V National Conference
Breckenridge, Colorado

Of Work and Earth
Curator, Coordinating Artist
(Group installation; catalog)
Firehouse Center for the Arts, Longmont, Colorado        

1999    
Reflexiones del Alma
(Group collaborative exhibit)
Orozco Gallery, National University of Mexico
Mexico City, Mexico
Galeria Rancho de Comate Cuitolco, by invitation of Nahum Zenil
Tenango del Aire, Mexico