I only want love that feels like rest, 2024

At KODA House on Governors Island, I Only Want Love That Feels Like Rest, invites visitors into a bedroom—a sanctuary, a container for healing, a space where softness and safety intertwine. Here, love is not something to be earned through suffering; it is a state of being, a place of rest.

Through photography, film, sculpture, mixed-media, and performance, I am building a world that reflects my journey—one of resilience, survival, and ultimately, the reclamation of self. My work is deeply personal, drawing from my experiences with childhood abuse, yet it extends beyond me. This exhibition is not only about my healing; it is about collective healing. It is an invitation.

During my artist activation, I will move through this space in a performance that is part ceremony, part play. Every motion, every interaction with the installation is an embodiment of the complex interplay between pain and recovery. In this space, love is not something I chase. Love is something I rest in. I only want love that feels like rest. I hope this space offers you the same.

KODA House, Building #407B, Colonels Row, Governors Island, New York

On View: October 6-27, 2024

Artist Activation: Sunday, October 6, 2024 from Noon-4pm

“Just things” (VIDEO), 2024, digital video book containing short film created in the style of A Kuleshov Effect Experiment

There is a story in each material choice, in each visual moment. In my video piece, Just Things, I engage with the Kuleshov Effect, a film technique that plays with perception and meaning. A juxtaposition of imagery—a battered face, a dollhouse, a broken watch, a pair of men’s shoes—forces the viewer to sit with the weight of association, the implied narratives of harm, time, and survival. The book that contains this film is labeled with evidence markings, a reminder of the documentation of trauma, yet inside, another message: fragile, handle HER with care.

I have chosen not to share this video publicly online. Instead, it will only be experienced in specific spaces—physical environments that serve as containers, both for me and for those who choose to witness. She—my younger self, the girl inside the book—was once invisible. She was silenced, alone. Through my practice, my voice, my presence, I now create spaces where softness is not an afterthought but a necessity. Where art is ritual. Where we are seen.

  • "every outfit is too small to hide my scars, so I stopped trying" (no.1), 2024

  • "my first job was a lifeguard. I was trained to save others at fifteen. I learned how to care for myself in my forties" (no.1), 2024

  • "skipped my prom, went in-patient psychiatric instead" (no.1), 2024

  • "my personal flotation devices, as a little black-latin girl" (no.1), 2024

  • "every outfit is too small to hide my scars, so I stopped trying" (no.2), 2024

  • "my first job was a lifeguard. I was trained to save others at fifteen. I learned how to care for myself in my forties" (no.2), 2024

  • "skipped my prom, went in-patient psychiatric instead" (no.2), 2024

  • "my personal flotation devices, as a little black-latin girl" (no.2), 2024

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