Artist Statement

This series explores the ideal of the nuclear family. Growing up I became increasingly aware of the societal pressures that told me happiness would come from a husband, a home, and children. I use these collage diptychs as a meditation and a practice of unlearning these subconscious thoughts. The imagery I am drawn to are perfect, the women exude beauty and light while the advertisements talk about conforming to gendered and capitalist norms

I rip the images as an act of surrender and destruction, I don’t know how the paper will decide to rip and I am simultaneously destroying the ideal that was embedded into the image itself. The collages on the left represent the perfection I associated with the nuclear family, while the right is a portrait of reality. . I aim to abstract these cultural concepts to question their validity in our ever-changing world.