I posted the first print in this series of prints yesterday, but I want to go ahead and catalog the full series on Instagram. The prints pictured are in order as follows:

The Sad Trudge Forward, Silkscreen, 11"x14", 2022

Wheel In The Sky, Silkscreen, 11"x14", 2021

To Grow A Man, Silkscreen, 11"x14", 2021

A Dance For Dominance, Silkscreen, 11"x14", 2022

I have been working on this series since I made the first print for a SAIC print exchange last summer. I started to explore the subject matter of this work after the end of my MFA thesis in 2020, but it has taken almost two years for me to feel confident with the direction I am heading. It feels different this time. The work feels sustainable, fresh, and perpetually exciting, which is a rare thing for any artist. I think that sentiment holds especially true in an age of unrivaled access to visual information. The prints featured in this post are an attempt to expand on ideas that were shaped in my previous solo shows postgraduate school. I see this series as the root of a complex deconstruction of patriarchal expectations referencing the male-sex role. I’m using Joseph Campbell’s codification of the Hero’s Journey, or the Mono-myth, as a format to construct, then deconstruct, a world where stereotypical male-sex behaviors run their course and evolve. The world where my work exists is meant to be self-contained, but not linear. Nonlinear ways of thinking are hard for me because I am a printmaker. I have a habit of making things sequentially, one step at a time. These prints are important because they feel like the foundation of a metaphorical world that exhibits real-world scenarios, and consequences, of a binary reality. I am hoping that my world births persons who are willing to leave the comfort of their many privileges in search of themselves; the beautiful, the tragic, and the inherent but unpredictable nature of life's numerous directions.

Ok, that's the end of my sappy, extensively written monologue. In closing, this work excites me and there's more coming. Promise!