In my work, I redefine contemporary folklore and handcraft through a skewed, contemporary lens forged from my ties to blue-collar work, rural cultures, generational afflictions, and upbringing in the American South. The topics I broach have become negated in the modern setting, because in the face of swelling urban sprawl and mutating technological advancements, crudities are viewed as an eyesore. However, beneath the roughhewn vernacular, regional hardships, family dynamics, and labor are the existential threads that ingrain people and communities together. Folklore has an adaptive nature that continuously absorbs, and it becomes a record through which people acknowledge change, map human geographies, and grapple with ideologies. As a conceptual artist, I utilize many materials and art forms, including fiber, sculpture, book art, photography, and writing, purposefully working with familiar and inclusive mediums. I use these forms to delve deeply into themes surrounding car culture, labor, crisis, family dynamics, community, and existentialism. 

Currently, I am sculpting flawed effigies of components from my late father’s vehicles using materials reminiscent of labor and craft, like sewn blue jeans and carved wood, to explore the deep complexity of existence because, like automobiles, there are multiple parts that contribute to its functionality. My father was a blue-collar worker his entire life, and the cars he drove represented pivotal moments that altered his path, so they have become the vessel through which I have tried to understand him – not just as my father but as a person containing multiple facets of human character. With our narrative interwoven, the larger questions of: Who are we to one another? Who remembers us? What happens to memory after we die? and What happens to our labor? are offered.