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I have come to my profession as an artist in an around about way. I grew up in a family of strong women who were extraordinary storytellers. I remember as a child sitting on the steps of my aunt's house In North Carolina shelling beans just picked and learning of Great grandparents, grand parents, aunts, uncles, and cousins long since past but whose presence remains strong.
I showed some talent with drawing as a child and young adult. My talent was seen as an oddity nothing to base a profession on or to peruse with any vigor because "you had to make a living". My father and brother and many of the men in our family were carpenters or masons, " useful professions". I worked construction sites with my brother from the time that I was eight years old till I went to college. I decided at that time, the best use of my desire for art and my trade of construction was Architecture, "a useful profession". My years of study at Parsons School of Design exposed me to such artist/architects as Allen Wexler, Vito Acconchi, and James Wines. These artists helped me expand the notion of architecture and observation. My years of work as a carpenter taught me the craft of materials.
During my years after Parsons School of Design I had the opportunity to work with a non-profit arts education organization in Harlem NY, Creative Arts Workshops (CAW) directed by Brooke Maxwell. CAW worked with homeless and formally homeless children from shelters in and around NYC. The children I met were mirrors of myself. Their lives could have been mine if any number of circumstances were marginally different. I learned from them the resilience of spirit and its need for home. And they I believe learned that you can change your situation and expand your horizons by altering the landscape around you, creating your own piece of home. To illustrate this we created a park to meet in by clearing and planting a vacant lot at 125th Street and Lexington Ave and erecting a tower that was our guardian spirit. The park was Called Calle de Sueno Street of dreams. This work was the beginning of a continuing exploration of, home, space and landscape.
My view on the aesthetics of the artist and art are very pragmatic. I believe this comes from my study of Architecture. Art should work on several levels. In all of my work I try to include some familiar object, a high level of craftsmanship, and a link through time to the viewer. The work I create illustrates the stories we all know as American, but they are suffused with the curious place that I, as an African American hold in that story, of home, place, loss, love, joy, and pain. My artworks as well as architecture have been a tool to reconcile my history, my place in this American society, and me.
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