The physical structure of our world, our place within in, and the stories we create through it indicate residual syntactical relationships to space (space as in the land, and space as in raced and gendered bodies) that the project of colonialism and empire have left on culture, by shaping our person-to-person and person-to-nature relationships. In this way the aesthetics of our psychic and physical environment are moulded to idealise patriarchal subject-object binaries (such as penetration of space, dominance, an ability to extract resources), and to position bodies and souls in hierarchies of value based on these concepts— all being the foundation of capitalism.
The ecological paradigms and aesthetic syntax of these inherited understandings is what I attempt to erode and reshape through my current work. The materials I bring into the paintings (Aloe Barbadensis, polystyrene and mirrors) embody more complicated understandings of existence and relation to the “other”. Aloe possesses the ostensibly phallic trait of penetrating flesh, but also possesses an ability to heal— a conventionally feminine attribute. Mirrors disrupt the plane of the artwork introducing a moment of awareness for the viewer of their contribution to the system within which the artwork and they are understood. Polystyrene, normally environmental waste, serves as a support for living plants. Through these transgressions, I attempt to share the envisioning of new, more equitable paradigms for value and space.