The Close Up Blocks Out the Rest of It
Mixed media: acrylic, paper collage, ink on wood

This piece captures a moment of joy held tightly against a world in unrest.
In the foreground: my favorite sister and my best friend, mid-laugh at Roots Picnic—sunlit, loud, alive. The closeness is intentional. Faces pressed forward. Connection amplified. The kind of intimacy that momentarily shields you from everything else.

But behind us, history refuses to stay quiet.

Layered into the background are drawn and collaged images of protest—past and present—marches, signs, and unrest woven into the surface like a low, persistent hum. These fragments remind us that even in moments of celebration, the world is still negotiating justice, power, and survival.

Across my shirt, partially obscured but legible enough, reads:
“ARE WE GREAT YET?”
A question posed with irony and exhaustion. An homage to the current political moment and the chaos unleashed in the wake of Trump’s election—where slogans ring louder than solutions, and uncertainty feels cyclical.

Wood grounds the piece, acting as both structure and witness. Acrylic and ink sketch the immediacy of memory, while collage fractures time—joy and resistance occupying the same plane.

This work is about proximity.
What we choose to focus on.
What we block out to survive.
And what still seeps through, no matter how close we stand to one another.