The Swan Song of Whitening Collage

This current series of collage prints explores the intersection between the messiness of ordinary life and dream or unconscious states that seek expression and integration. This creative process of deconstruction and reconstruction is a language that communicates what can’t be communicated in any other way. The balance between structure and feeling, containment and chaos. Practicing an intuitive approach to collage, I attempt to deconstruct and recreate the Self, while bringing awareness to personal experiences that have influenced my life as a woman. For me, it is a way of processing and coming to terms with grief, loss and separation. What emerges is a sense of transformation, renewal and a deeper understanding of the threads that have led to this moment, and to the re-birth of a more integrated sense of individuality. Using the tension between personal mythology and allegory and the found material of consumer culture, I honour the archetypal sacred feminine in all her inner seasons and erotic nuances, all her cycles of birth, destruction, decomposition and life-giving. My intention with this growing body of work is to give a visual language to personal experiences that are too vulnerable, too intimate, uncomfortable, painful, taboo or sometimes far more complex than can be articulated with words. Through contemplation, of breathing consciousness into the inevitable, universal and cyclical states of being into life, I honour the spaces of tension in between these transitions and inner seasons. This art of reconstruction thus becomes an empowering way to create new narratives for a range of life experiences while making space new possibilities. I live and work as an Artist and Designer, in Cape Town, South Africa.