My work explores notions of invasiveness, impermanence, and the unseen in relation to the Great Lakes. The transparent waters are a deceptive indicator of the health of the ecosystems below the surface. With climate change, invasive species, and polluted waters, the lakes are quickly devolving into a water desert at the heart of North America. My practice includes researching the history of the lakes, taking field notes while on visits to Lake Michigan and spending hours on the beach, observing the waters and collecting, amongst others, man-made remnants found in the sand. 

Along the Great Lakes, where the waves meet the beach on the margin of the shore, I collect various specimens the lake has turned over to the sandy perimeter. Each object, strewn haphazardly along the sand, is a piece of the story. A narrative begins to form amongst the found materials: beach glass, flat shale, driftwood, cigarettes, nurdles, feathers, black sand, dune roots, plastic, shells, balloons, beetles, cigar mouthpieces, face masks, straws, crinoid fossils, more plastic, rusty crawfish claws, bones, toy army men and fishhooks. Much of this evidence tells a deeper truth as to what is going on at the heart of Great Lake’s waters, such as the sharp white shells of zebra and quagga mussels, found indiscriminately amongst the lake detritus.  

Back in my studio, there is a colorful array of bric-a-brac that I carefully begin to sort and organize. When the material was muddled amongst the sand of the shore, it was indecipherable, more of a jumble of letters than a clear sentence.  However, categorized by type and color into vintage glass vials, a narrative emerges: trapped balloon ribbons writhe in a vial, mussel shells are crunched together in a fraction of their presence on shore, and a pink barbie spoon is displayed alone in a cage of glass. Each tube becomes a page of the story, each with neatly separated objects, clearly demarcated through labels and rubber caps. Monarch butterfly wings exhibited alongside articles of the Anthropocene. The result is a chronicle of beach-finds, neatly displayed, each object a word, each tube a page, together a book.  

While I have found many clues amongst the sand, I am still a stranger to the ecosystems beneath the water. It’s impossible to know the vast number of environmental issues the Great Lakes face without outside research. The habitat in the water was forever altered with the construction of the Welland Canal, when worldly ships passed through the front doors, carrying uninvited visitors in their bellies. Soon after, the water ecologies of the lakes were condemned by the introduction of sea lamprey, alewives, round eyed goby, zebra and quagga mussels. In my work, I utilize these creatures’ likeness, replicating their detrimental multiplication through the inherently repetitive nature of printmaking.   

Through lithography, block printing, screen printing, and etching, I create a bounty of material to cut up and collage. I am constantly repurposing prints, mixing media and experimenting with results that twist, squirm, pucker, tuck and multiply.  The prints are not restrained in two dimensions as I fold, crease, crinkle and morph my collaged prints into handheld paper boats. They hover, suspended above an artificial beach in the gallery, crowded and packed into a channel flush against a white wall.  My varying bodies of work come together like the threshold of the shore, where the sand meets the water. Some material found, some created and manipulated to tell a narrative about the health and wellness of the Great Lakes in these modern times.