Grounding Ceremony documents the ceremonial release of my hair, which began with a sacred burial ritual. I begin by digging a hole into the Earth.  I ultimately enter that hole, where I cut each of my locs one by one. Each loc represents another level of release and cleansing, until all of my locs have been cut, marking the full release of the past. I was not the same person upon rising from the Earth that day, with my cut locs surrounding me, appearing like wings. 

Hair holds experiences, and a tree grows best when it has strong, solid roots. This ceremony released me from what I had been holding tightly to; and by rooting myself within the Earth for that process, I was able to transmute that energy so that I could emerge renewed. This video documents a very vulnerable moment of release and spiritual grounding. With the release of my hair, so many other things were also shed from my life. This work documents a true transition and rite-of-passage for me. 

My grandfather, also an interdisciplinary artist, has a deep impact on my art practice—my mother’s writing, my grandmother’s sewing and my great grandmother’s quilting have all found manifestation in my work. Each medium I use is its own language. I create narrative works that evolve over time. Often materials, processes or residual elements of one work—for example, ashes from a fire, hair, or soil—will find new life in another piece years later. For example, my hair, cut during my ritual performance “Grounding Ceremony” (2011) can be found sewn into “Genetic Memory”. 

I have always felt an intuitive connection to quilting & working with fibers. I'm drawn to the meditative process and the intertwining poetic qualities of memory, material and intergenerational histories. My Grandmother and I are currently collaborating on a series of quilts. 

In addition to quilting, I work with a combination of techniques, including sewing, bleaching and dyeing fabric. I combine self-portraits, existing family photographs, MRI brain scans of my Mother’s brain and portraits of family that I have taken with natural fabrics, such as mudcloth and cotton.

My Grandmother helped me to create my first 6ft by 7ft quilt commission for the Reginal F. Lewis Museum in 2007. I later learned that my Grandmother’s Mother, Josephine, had been a quilter and had created a few quilts in her lifetime. There are also influences in this work from the women of Gee’s bend. I have been deeply inspired by these women and their quilts. I believe I may have some ancestral connection there as well.

Through this work I explore family stories, even those with many missing pieces. Having never met my paternal father, many aspects of my lineage are a mystery to me; so call on the unknown as I explore my own inner journey in understanding impermanence, surrender, death, fluidity, and the infiniteness of the self as it connects to the interwoven fabric of the cosmos.