The moment I realized art was more than technical skill and object representation was around 7th grade. At the time, I had been rejected from the Alabama School of Fine Arts after the first rounds of review.

When I got my rejection notice, I took the work I had submitted and the portfolio I had prepared to my middle school art teacher in rural Odenville, Alabama. I asked her what was wrong with the work, and at the time, all I considered art to be was perfected technical skill, so I focused on capturing objects and images in perfect semblance. My art teacher had asked me at the time what the work was about, a question I answered by saying I didn't know, I just made it because it looked right. In that moment, she explained to me that how we view an image and how we imagine an image are different, and that perfecting a technical skill can only take you so far. She gave me the advice to write alongside my work. Whenever I had a thought or noticed something that made me imagine something, I wrote it down.

Obviously, there are nuances to this way of thinking that 7th-grade me didn't fully understand, and the work wasn’t groundbreaking or overly conceptual. But it was more honestly a part of me than before, and that experience showed me that if I didn’t take my work seriously, then the opportunities I dreamed of would always be out of reach.

I think as an artist, rational thinking just blends into intuitive expression. When I create work, I dont think of principles of art, like line, shape, variation, color, or composition. An image comes to me based on an emotion or memory, and I just allow it to happen. What is rational to me is always intuitive when creating work.

I often have pieces in my head that I want to copy and paste into reality. But the truth is that those ideas can be influenced by things unattainable to me at the time. Like when I see artists with unlimited material, space, and technical skill, I often find myself wishing for that. I have to remind myself that my work is meant to meet me where I am, not be something it can’t be.

So when I find myself longing for more permanent studio space, or more materials, or better skills, I remind myself that everything I need is provided. A studio can be anywhere, a friend's kitchen or living room, a park or backyard, and materials can be anything, and can be obtained anywhere.

I am blessed enough to be surrounded by artists, professors, friends, and family who are more than willing to allow me to barter or borrow their materials, or use their equipment or space. Who are willing to teach and show me anything I may need to know to make an idea a reality. In the end, the art will happen, no matter the limitation or challenge.

I don’t mind at all. The work I make will always be a part of me; no work I make is without care or meaning. Each piece is a piece of me. Once it’s completed, it doesn't lose its meaning or connection to me. The whole reason I make the work is to connect with the viewer, in hopes we can understand and see each other. I intend the viewer to interpret whatever it is they see within the piece.

Maybe a woven landscape doused in red and yellow is a representation of my suffocation, and to my viewer, it makes them feel retrospective, or makes them remember a moment in their life where they have felt intense emotion.

Obviously, as an artist, I use tools like color, atmosphere and perspective with visual language to guide my viewer into a feeling when they view my work. But my intent isn't to control them. The work is made with a part of me, for a part of my viewer, so we can understand each other. So maybe the audience and I have amicable joint custody over the artwork.

I hope when you view my work for the first time, you feel as though a part of you is seen by me. That things are never truly forgotten or abandoned, and that the work is here to remind you of what you may have forgotten.

Yes, all my work is influenced by my family, location, culture, and education. I was born and raised in Alabama, and moved between Trussville, Odenville, Springville, and Alabaster, all within a 50-mile radius of central Birmingham.

Birmingham is largely populated and has busy roads, tall office buildings, and hosts large-scale public events. Trussville, Springville, and Alabaster are all family-centric cities. They have nice school systems with extensive sports programs, as well as small family-owned shops and boutiques.

But they aren't all that similar. Springville’s neighborhood is anchored by a central church and a walkable town center. Alabaster and Trussville couldn't ever be walkable, even if the cities tried, with Alabaster being much more open-spaced and Trussville a little overdeveloped. Odenville is on the rural spectrum of these four locations.

Each city has its own culture, atmosphere, and expectations attached to it, all of which have affected my art and informed the way I create images and layering.

Educationally, my art practice and mentality wouldn’t exist if it weren't for the Alabama School of Fine Arts Visual Arts Department. It's the school I attended from 8th to 12th grade, and where I learned to have ambitions, how to express myself, and how to be honest with myself and others.

It’s where I was taught that my work and voice mattered. The experience I had in the Visual Arts Department, surrounded by my class of 10 and my overly patient instructors, is what made me into the artist and person I am today.

I feel as though I still rely on all of them now, and often look back on the advice they have given me. For their care, time, and confidence in me, I will always be grateful.

I actually don’t know. I have sketchbooks filled with ideas and experiments I have never tried, so maybe I’d take as much time as I’d like to try every idea. That opportunity to freely experiment without worry would allow my work to be better informed of all possibilities.

In my mind, every real place is just a memory. Every street I walk, every building I enter, and any land I see, I always imagine what was and how it came to be.

There are layers to every reality and real-world tangible thing that holds human connection. The home I lived in as a child is still a real place, but the memories of that place are just layers, covered up by the new family that now builds memories on top of mine.

Their life leaves imprints: crayons on painted-over walls, the flaking paint in the living room, the leftover smell of hand-rolled cigarettes, covered now by some other family's laundry detergent and vanilla-scented candles.

When I create a piece, it's because I have encountered a place that connects to these memories, and it makes me think of who has been and is within that place.

If we have the capacity of remembering, then the land and structures built upon it surely have to remember us as well. So I like to take the real place and merge it with the residue of what was or could have been.

I think that deep down, all my work is founded on a fear or acknowledgement of abandonment. It’s a very human fear that we can all connect with.

When I see homes decaying and weathered, fragments of impressions in lawns of tire marks, or the stripped color of a car due to the harsh sun, it makes me think of how those objects came to be that way.

A home built to once shelter and protect a family or person, made of memories and purpose, but now forgotten and abandoned either from lack of care or due to its qualities. A lawn destroyed and overgrown because it’s no longer a place for kids to play, or for others to admire, and a car sun-washed because at some point someone forgot or was unable to drive it.

Life is fast-paced, and we often can’t find time to care for the things around us. I just have a deep connection to those things. In some way, I fear that I’ll forget to care, that care will become overwhelming, or that others will become overwhelmed by having to care for me.

In some capacity, we can all connect to that fear or knowledge of abandonment, and I choose this visual language because it’s the signs of abandonment that we encounter every day, no matter our location.