All My Dreams of You

This is part of the exhibition entitled RICOCHET. Working with the bullet (seen by many as evil) and the image of a woman (the vulnerable), a deluge of images and issues confront me as an individual and a member of the larger society. My research on women was invigorated during my visit to the Topkapi Palace in Istanbul. I could hear the whispers of untold stories of the Harem along its walls.

These instruments of death are products of the human creative spirit. Mechanized efficiency, technology: tools. These tools, objectively speaking, are no different to the tools with which I work. Leather in my work represents bare skin, the porous armor that delicately shelters us from the "evils" of the world and rubber is the epitome of elasticity. Together they emulate the resiliency of a woman. These ingredients all compliment my explorations of the identity, power and violence in a modern world.

Contemporary philosopher, Judith Butler’s concept on “corporeal vulnerability…that the human body is a social phenomenon, exposed to others and vulnerable by definition” – has provided a framework in my explorations. Is our body simply a delicate casing of a “precarious life?” Are we defined by what is around us? Do the weak incite the strong to prey? Is violence spurred by the precariousness of life?

My inquiry continues as a psychological process. I continue to examine our societal and human nature: the manifestation of opposing creative and destructive forces.