About
In my fibre and fine arts, I explore the relationship between the natural and human world, as well as the complexities of witnessing one's own embodiment within that world. In particular, I unite self-expression with personal, social, and environmental advocacy, focusing on beauty (art for its own sake) and purpose (art for the sake of a cause). In my creative process, I often find myself asking: What can art do in the world? How can it help us see things in a new way? Does it have ethical as well as aesthetic capacities? And how can artists stimulate awareness, deeper thought, and positive action without losing creative integrity or sliding into sloganism?
I have long been interested in this relationship between aesthetics and ethics. Trained as an English professor, I taught ethics and social justice through the lens of literature and the arts for close to a decade. Stepping down from my academic post in 2017 due to a complex chronic illness, I have continued to explore the relationship between ethics and aesthetics, but in a concrete way – at an easel and sewing machine – rather than in a philosophical or literary one.
