It’s funny, but I’ve felt guilty not posting so frequently here, not sharing art. It’s been a seemingly quiet few months of freelancing— a lot of possibles, a few wonderful jobs I can’t share quiet yet, but in all honesty I’m grateful for the slow period. It’s been a nice incubation time for Cosmic Forest. This is a lot of work (at least, I think it looks like it!) but not even close to done. I have lofty goals- textiles, a mobile, sculpture… and only thirty-seven days.

I feel very lucky working on this project— although a month ago you would’ve found me nearly ripping my hair out in stress. The truth is, I didn’t know where things were going or what I wanted to make. Being in an illustration mindset, I felt like things had to be this big intense project, I had to have a meaning from the get-go and when I was stumped in late winter/early spring, I worried I had no ideas. And I felt so strongly things needed to be perfect that I wasn’t allowing myself to explore and make accidents and find joy in making (case in point: those little vessel pieces were scrap paper and totally unplanned but I really love them). I felt I needed to ape my illustration work in paint, which after a while I learned I just cannot do 100% yet. All this work relates, of course, but working digitally has spoiled me, and learning how to be okay with my analog skills to date has been a tough lesson to learn. But allowing myself to play and make the best work I can with the skills I’ve got has allowed me to open up the parameters and figure out what this show could be. Every day I am coming up with a little corner of this world and it delights me. I don’t know what to do with Cosmic Forest after this— but I’d love to set something within this world. A book? An animation? We’ll see.

The other thing that I noticed when framing this all was that there’s this predominance of black and darkness in the work. Which if you’ve seen my work, black is just not a color I utilize frequently. It’s funny to work this way. But I think despite this darkness it’s more mysterious and raucous than dark and bleak. I’m going to work on some gouache and pastel drawings on black paper. I can’t wait.

I’m really excited to share it with you. I won’t post too much of it between now and 7/15, because I don’t want to ruin the surprise (even though I am really bad at keeping secrets about my work). But I’m sure we’ll share some process along the way.