I feel comfortable alone. The familiar solitude drapes around me like a warm blanket in the night, a heaviness you can shelter in and lose yourself to. Sometimes loneliness and memories of abandonment come with it, sometimes only contentment. This inner world became the base of my work. From a young age, I often found myself seeking to be alone; connection with other people can be difficult, but interiority offered a retreat. I found comfort in nature, games, and imagination, which supported me in my growing fascination with drawing. Growing up in the forests of eastern Ohio and the hills surrounding the Ohio River, the wilderness was a familiar friend. I was drawn to the haunting wails of loons, the far-away feeling of walking deep in the woods, and the dark silhouettes of trees just outside the range of a campfire’s glow. The unsettling strangeness of nature remains a major interest for me along with horror and fantasy. When I transitioned to focusing on paint, I brought these themes with me and connected to them and myself through the physicality and practice of painting. I draw from familiar spaces, both human structures and beyond, to explore my feelings of connection, disconnection, and identity. In my paintings, I can be myself and communicate the world that I live in, one deeply absorbed in observation and a dark, secluded homeliness shaped by ripples of introspection, environmentalism, and decay.