Hi!

Prior to now, my website has been all about travel, but… the thing is, I’m not often traveling. What I am often doing is creating things – whether that’s drawing or painting or writing. I don’t know if this marriage is going to be successful, but I figured I would give it a go.

I think the best way to do this is to share what I’ve been working on every week, and provide some insight into each drawing, and what inspired me.

I’ve been trying to draw nearly every day for the past two years, after drawing sporadically on and off majority of my life. For many years, I thought I’d never be “good enough,” but what does that mean? How could I possibly ever get good enough if I don’t at least try? Besides, “good enough” is sort of an ever-evasive, invisible measuring stick.

SO – to begin, I want to share some recent favorites from the past year, before I get into posting more recent work.

I figured the best way for me to begin sharing my art with you all is a sunflower. Sunflowers are especially important to me. When I first got sober at 17, I spent a lot of time painting and drawing sunflowers. They’ve been a consistent theme in my art throughout the years, a visual symbol to represent my sobriety and struggles.

Funnily enough, this image actually snuck its way into a Superbowl Porsche commercial. It’s very, very quick, but it makes an appearance at 1:42. Take a look!

This image is one of my favorites from last year. At the time, I was studying hands, but hands alone can be sort of boring. To make things more interesting, I would combine the hands with other elements that I enjoyed drawing – leaves, skeletons, lips, vines.

I love combining humans with plants, but since it’s such a recurring theme in my work, I sometimes worry the viewer might think it’s redundant. That’s okay! Also – if you don’t know this about me, I love long nails. The reference I used for this image was my own hand… and yes, my nails were that long at the time.

I’m always hesitant to draw pieces that reflect self-harm and addiction, but considering they’re a part of my past, I think it’s important to push through that hesitation. While perhaps rather uncomfortable subject matter, I think it provides a visual balance between beauty and destruction. Can you guess whose hand that is?

Clearly there’s a theme going on here! Keep in mind, all of these drawings are from the same time frame, so there’s a similar color palette and style. I think since then, my style has developed quite a bit.

Here’s a slightly different style! Since I was focused so close to the eyeball, and wanted that and the fungus to be the main focus, I think I spent more time on detail than I normally would on an eye. This fungus is called a cordyceps – it’s a fungus that takes over insects and renders them immobile, eventually killing them and sprouting fungi blooms from the inside out.

I couldn’t help but laugh while uploading this piece because while my drawings aren’t super hyperrealistic, this is such a bizarre, twisted concept. Why has their face cracked off? Why has their back split open and their spine has a flower that’s about to bloom? It’s ridiculous. But… I love it. I hope you do, too!

I’ll probably be posting a few other favorites from last year before moving on to more recent stuff. One thing to keep in mind is that most of these posts will probably be in a sort of “past tense,” because I like to have a big gap between what I post and what I’m currently working on. This gives me enough time to produce content worth sharing without feeling like I have to churn out impressive work every day. Some days, things just don’t look good! And that’s okay. I don’t know that I’m aiming for perfection anymore – I think it’s more so that it’s become a daily habit. Art is meditation for me.

Stay tuned for more of my work!