Historically, portraits elevate their subjects, affirming their worthiness of being seen and remembered. While portraiture has always served as witness to the powerful, I look to document the often unseen: the trash accumulating on my street block over the course of a month, portraits of New Yorkers scaled not to the sitter, but to the square footage they of their apartments, the pets I neglected and accidentally killed as a child, the women both here and gone in my family tree, and, most recently, the birds around me.

John Berger writes that capitalism has fractured the bond between humans and animals, reducing animals to commodities or images. This loss diminishes us both, denying animals their agency and severing our own connection to nature. Yet birds continue to live parallel to our own lives, ubiquitous yet often overlooked. They offer one of our few regular encounters with the wild, one in which the animal returns our gaze.

In my paintings, each bird is not a cataloged representation of its species, but a specific individual with agency. By emphasizing the unique personality of specific birds, I seek to restore what capitalism erodes: the recognition of animals not as resources or specimens, but as individuals whose lives run parallel to our own and are worthy of documentation through portraiture.


Group Exhibit curated by Liliana Porter, Steinbaum Krauss Gallery, New York, NY
“The Neurotic Art Show II: The Return of the Repressed,”Artists Space, New York, NY
“Return of the Cadaver Exquis,” The Drawing Center, New York, NY
‘Spellbound in Soho,’ ‘A Room With A View’ Dia Printed Matter, New York, NY
“The Exchange Show,” Pierogi, Brooklyn, NY