The Recipe for Identity:

The art displayed in this series is work created or curated from my past work during one of my home artist residencies.  At the time I created the residency, I was also entering a new chapter of my life. I have a strong sense of who I am, but as I move through middle age, I wanted to evaluate who I was becoming. There are a lot of conflicting messages for a middle-aged woman. We are told to chase and retain youth. We are also told that we are entering a stage from which we will emerge as wise and benevolent if we embrace our age. Throughout my life, I have experienced the conflicting push and pull of the messages within our society. I wanted to explore the effects of those messages which meant exploring the different phases of my life from childhood through adulthood. It also meant that I needed to evaluate how illness, mental health, family, cultural expectations, and a person’s sense of home and belonging affect identity.

While these explorations focus on my own journey, I hope they inspire others to discuss and evaluate their own identities.