First Breath

In January of 2017, I woke up from an ethereal dream of a woman wrapped in the American flag spinning in fetal position underwater. A faint sizzling and popping sound rushed to fill my ears as light beams rhythmically magnified the colors of skin, red, white, and every kind of blue- all swirling together. The dream was so overwhelmingly beautiful, I could barely breathe, but somehow…I was. Calmly inhaling and exhaling like returning to the womb.

The dream felt like a whisper from God. It began as merely ‘watching’ a woman spinning underwater and turned into a ‘first-person’ experience that inspired the Seven Flags of St. Croix series. I had no idea it would take over 2 years to complete, and that my own belief system would be reconstructed in the process by confronting concepts the imagery explored.

There are moments, actually most of them, when I feel so confused about what I'm painting. Fire and water, flags, molecules, bridal gowns, broken stained glass, and people underwater? I don't even have words for this most of the time. As I write, it feels like I'm grasping to find language for something I don't fully understand…which reinforces the metaphor even more- like trying to explain something underwater- or scream or run under here. You can only hold your breath for so long until you go back to the surface or…surrender.

“First Breath” is a closer look at those moments of going under. Choosing to submit to a loss of control, comfort, even a certain kind of dying to find deep faith.