Drawings & Paintings

Faces of Courage Series: Artist Statement

 

My series, Faces of Courage, are realistic oil paintings dealing with the topic of poverty and are portraits of individuals who attended the Hope Center, Walking Tall, and the Anchor Church in Wilmington, NC. These paintings are an attempt to represent those in poverty with a sense of dignity and beauty.

 

My mother and grandparents grew up in poverty and had been shuffled around foster care, as an older child she was adopted, but she never forgot where she came from. Her love of everyone and for the arts greatly influenced my life. My series, Faces of Courage, are realistic oil paintings of portraits dealing with this topic of poverty and individuals who attend the support groups in Wilmington, NC.

 

I had been working with The Hope Center since January 2016, and other groups such as Walking Tall, and Vigilant Hope. My series was to show the beauty of everyone, and to show those individuals in a positive light who are part of these groups. Everyone in the series was paid to model, and part of my photography process. They also received a copy of their painting and many also saw themselves at Cameron Art Museum in 2017 during my presentation at CAM and solo show.

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Post Graduate School

 

After graduate school I had continued for a period of time volunteering with Walking Tall of Wilmington, The Hope Center- which became Hope Recuperative Care, Vigilant Hope, and currently Eden Village. Eden Village is a community whose mission is to help the chronically homeless have a permanent roof over their heads in a tiny home within a community that has health care, community center, and gardening. I am very happy to have started my new venture with them, while including Cape Fear Community College where I instruct fine arts and graphic design courses. We had hosted a fundraiser at the Wilma Daniels Gallery with a silent auction where 100% of the proceeds of 18 paintings went to EV. I am honored to have partnered with EV and CFCC and coordinated our departments through nursing, dental, OT, EWD, and Phi Theta Kappa students.

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My graphic design work has come back into action through my students at CFCC where I instruct Drawing 1, 2D, and Illustration. I have enjoyed teaching students skills of Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator, and InDesign. I have recently started exploring Adobe Express as well and that is a great surprise for a free app to create professional feeds for Instagram and social media. I have also been working with CFCC creating websites for the last show, and I am slated to be working with students in continuing education for web design. My concepts for all that I work with is for them to gain strong professional practice skills in areas that can give them real world experiences for a career.

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