Bearing Witness
April 5 – April 27,2025
These drawings bear witness to the lives of people crossing borders—manmade and psychological—who seek to escape hardship and trauma, hoping for safety and refuge. Bearing witness firsthand to others’ experiences makes us present for injustice, gives voice to privation, and connects us on a human level. A witness assures that stories are heard truthfully, to transcend time and difference. Reality is less meaningful if no one bears witness and attends to our stories. How do we respond to the trauma, conflict, and stresses of today’s world? This collection seeks to bear witness to the fullness of people, each with a past, present, and future. Who are they, what motivated them to cross, what did they leave behind? What trauma did they endure at home and on their journey? What is their vision? What prompts their hope, their faith in crossing?
Artist Statement
My vision is to explore individual character within the world in which we live. Through internal, person-centered narratives, my drawings ask how we define ourselves within our social context, such as how we carry our past with us as the lens through which we view the present, and how we seek human connection.
Drawing is everything to me. I work within a narrative, a moment in a story, an internal exploration of an external event. I focus on contemporary, social justice/humanist themes with both intimate and broad implications, stories experienced through life in Washington, DC, through my former work in a community mental health clinic, or what I’m reading.
The result, I hope, is thoughtful, intriguing, truthful, and a bridge between self-exploration and how to translate such understanding into action in our present world.
