Old Picnic, 2026. Oil on canvas, 54 x 72"
Civil War Bike Route, 2026. Oil on canvas, 45 x 60"
Rose Edge, 2026. Oil and acrylic on canvas, 30x40"
Trail of Tears (facing east // facing west), 2026. Oil on canvas, 40 x 83"
As I looked into its golden heart, 2026. Oil on canvas, 24 x 20"
Mountains, 2025. Oil on canvas, 30 x 45"
Broadleaf Plantain (White man's footstep), 2025. Oil on canvas, 12 x 12"
In the summer of 2019, I bought my first house, located on Sunrise Avenue in Springfield, Missouri. After purchasing the house, I learned about the specific history of the land. My property was located on the “wire road” (the Butterfield Overland Mail route), the Trail of Tears, and a very short distance from the site of the first major Civil War battle west of the Mississippi (Wilson's Creek). It was a lovely, one-acre property with mature trees and space and kind neighbors, but for the entire 5 years that I lived there I felt inexplicable dread. I have since relocated to another state, and this distance and clearer head has intensified my reflection on this previous home site. I am interested in how this yard and immediate neighborhood carry a tension between daily suburban mundaneness and a lot of extremely contentious and consequential history for this country. These paintings are not narrative presentations of that history, but rather reflections on the ground where these tensions reside.