About

I originally hail from Dallas, Texas, and am currently a death doula and artist living and working in Fairfax, Virginia. I received my MFA in Studio Art, with a concentration in Printmaking, from the University of Tennessee. While trained as a printmaker, my work also includes drawings, paintings, and collage. I am trained as an end of life doula through INELDA. I believe that everyone deserves a good death. I view the role of an end of life doula similarly to the way I view art. How can we take stock of our stories, the important events in our lives, the loves, losses, accomplishments, beauty, hardship, joy, delight? How do we view the relationship we have to self, to others, to the world, to the Universe? How are our own stories woven with the stories of others? If we are given the opportunity to take stock of our lives, I believe that is a powerful gift we can give ourselves as well as our loved ones. We don’t have to wait until a terminal diagnosis to do this! I view the little losses and closing of life chapters as practice; how can I let this situation/ idea/ belief go so that there is room for something new to grow? How do I handle loss? How do I handle transition? These are all questions we can ask ourselves as we journey through life. How we practice this daily can prepare us for death. I learned about becoming a death doula several years ago, but I kept putting the idea on the back burner. Finally, it became clear to me that it was time to train through INELDA. To learn more about preparation for the end of life, please contact me.

Artist statement:

My work draws from a variety of subjects; the natural world, mythology, folk and fairy tales, poetry, the Tarot, my traveling experiences, inner child work, my experiences homeschooling with my child, knitting, weaving, and gardening. The world is full of stories; we retell, recreate, believe, refute, unravel, restructure, recycle, compost, and resurrect them endlessly. We pull and choose the threads of story and meaning to weave our own experiences with those around us. This, I believe, makes life fascinating and beautiful. I find delight in the ongoing process of running stories and images through my mind like threads on a loom, and rearranging them to create new imagery. I reuse images over and over, turning them around, combining them with visual "ingredients" to make a new combination, a new visual story.