“TAKE CARE”

An evolving portrait series | 2024 to present

"Take Care" is a portrait/ sculpture-based body of work that explores the quiet, powerful, and often unseen ways we care for ourselves and each other. Rooted in themes of healing, protection, softness, and survival, this series uplifts real people who embody care in everyday ways such as presence, tenderness, rest, resilience, and radical love.

This series began with a portrait I painted of my pregnant self when I was four months postpartum. In that moment, I was navigating the physical, emotional, and spiritual weight of becoming a mother. That act of painting myself was a declaration: I see you. I honor you. From that first piece, the work grew into a larger inquiry into how care shows up in our lives—how it stretches us, sustains us, and sometimes saves us.

"Take Care" marks a shift in both concept and approach. It’s slower. More vulnerable. It centers real people as both muse and mirror—offering portraits that ask, What does it mean to be well? To protect your peace? To show up fully, even when you're running on empty?

To create this work, I’ve invited people to complete a short reflective form. The form includes a few open-ended questions that help me understand their personal relationship to care. How they offer it, receive it, and imagine it. The answers inform the tone, color, composition, and symbolism within each portrait. It's a way of building trust between the subject and artist, and grounding each piece in lived experience.

If you’ve been invited to be part of Take Care, it means I see something powerful and necessary in the way you move through the world. Thank you for sharing your story.