 animals inspire me first and foremost. As soon as I started working at the Bronx Zoo I just completely fell in love with the animals there and it turned around my whole practice because I really wanted to say something meaningful about the animals and about all the conservation issues that I was learning about at the Bronx Zoo. The reaction is really an emotional roller coaster because you know everybody knows that it's not okay anymore to have tiger skins on a wall. So when people initially see my work they kind of get a little outraged or they're like, what is that doing there? There's obviously not a place for animal skins on the wall anymore. And then if they allow themselves to come in and collaborate with the work and kind of find out what it is and then they find out that it's knitted and the reaction completely turns around and becomes like, oh it's knitted and knitting has this whole connotation about comfort and warmth and so the reaction goes from kind of this what is going on to like oh it's knitted and then there's this invitation then for people to really look at the work and really understand that. And then they're allowed to like like the work then they're allowed to appreciate the beauty of the animals because the knitting gives them access to help them understand what's going on. As an artist I have BFA and an MFA from Pat Institute in New York City and I've worked in a lot of different sculptural mediums. My degrees were in sculpture and I kind of rediscovered a fascination with knitting that I had as a child. My mother and my aunt taught me how to knit and I rediscovered that love of knitting and working at the zoo I realized that the textural visual aspects of knitting could be something that I could use to actually describe the animals. And so I changed my medium over to knitting in around 2005. With Martial.com I have my buttons for my social media, Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest page even and it's really simple to sign up to my newsletter which is on every page of my website and I send out regular bulletins about what I'm doing and where you can see it. Hello everyone, on behalf of Constructing Outlook, welcome to the Monetary here at the Australian Consulate. It's a fantastic exhibition space and we're delighted to have this artwork on the wall so we've got some tremendous artwork here and it's certainly right up to you with some of the things that we've had here. It's really important to kind of stick to your guns and continue to do what you're passionate about and fight for what you really want to do. I've lived in New York City for 20 years and I can really be truthful and say that it's only been in the last several years that things have really started to happen for me. So you've really got to look at things in the wall to consulate. This coming August actually marks the 20th anniversary of me arriving in New York City and so I really call America and Australia my home so to kind of celebrate that in a part of Australia which is the Australian Consulate General in New York City which is like my other home is just like really super special and really spotlight for me.