 I realized that art was my passion after I had quit my career as an accountant. I quit and decided to take some time to figure out what I really wanted to do. And I was writing a lot, trying to figure that out, and then I started drawing. And I took an art class and took another art class, and then I decided to build up a portfolio and apply to art school. And it was really through that process that I realized that I'm an artist and art is really my true passion. Throughout my time in elementary school, I was really into art a lot. And I had a great art teacher who put me in shows at a local art college and that kind of stuff in elementary school. So I was really into art then. And growing older, I kind of grew out of it a little bit, I'd say, but also wasn't exposed to as much. I went to a Catholic high school and there wasn't much of an art program to speak of. So I kind of lost sight of it a little bit. And it wasn't until later that I realized that it came back to it as my passion and realized how much impact that time in elementary school did have on art for me as a passion. I was really drawn to sculpture because I acknowledged that my thinking process is really three-dimensional and I use my body a lot to express myself. So I found two-dimensional works of art like printmaking and painting. I love doing them but they are kind of limiting in respect that I can express myself better in three-dimension. As soon as I say I focus on three-dimension more, I make a lot of video art as well. So that loosely falls under sculpture as a media because there isn't anywhere else in the school where it fits logically. So I do approach it from a sculpture perspective and try to create an immersive 3D environment with my videos. And that being said, I also do a lot of found-object assemblages. I do like paintings and I do performance as well. I'm really inspired by transdisciplinary artists. One of my favorite artists is Sterling Ruby. He is a young artist based in LA. He makes video cast-brons, ceramics, large soft works. And I'm really drawn to that ability to move from any medium and really create something that is yours and your message no matter what the medium. In my work, I really try to recall my own memories of moments of change. And in doing so, I hope they manifest in my objects and videos and performances as a way for the viewer to then see those moments of change and open up that space with themselves to maybe introspect on something in their lives that could be changed, could be better. So it's that moment of change or optimism for the viewer is what I'm trying to create with my artwork. My development as a sculptor really can be attributed to my professors here at Mecca, absolutely. They won't accept anything less than your full potential. So that really got me up to speed quickly as far as working 3D. And I started out really trying to activate architectural space, drawing in space that helped taking what I had experience with drawing or printmaking or painting and really translating that into 3D. And then going a step further and incorporating things such as time and space relations and also focusing on transcending time and space. I have created functional works of art. I've taken a woodworking class, I've made a desk, I've made bowls in my bronze casting class but function isn't really something in my studio practice that's important to me. It's more the idea and communicating the idea for the viewer. Space is very important to me. I surf and I'm a mountaineer so it's very important to me to get into the environment into wide open spaces and from that I draw on those experiences and I translate that space into a smaller, more intimate experience for my viewer of my work be it wall piece or even a three dimensional piece in the round. I reference the landscape quite a bit with line and large scale. Thinking of a piece that I made using large drain pipes and it was about 10 feet long and interspersed in the drain pipes was playground balls creating different elements of landscape. One artwork that really created an aha moment for me was when I happened to walk into Matthew Barney's Cream Master Cycle at the Guggenheim in New York. This was long before I started to pursue a career in the arts but looking back I could see how influential that moment was to the work I'm making now. His use of scales just like totally over the top. Nothing's too big for him. He had blimps and helicopters and motorcycles and filled the entire museum with his work so perfectly well and that's something that I strive to do as well. Leaving Mecca and having my work continue to evolve is quite... I'm considering it a challenge at this point. I'm going to be working full time and it's going to be a struggle to keep up my practice but I'm designing a way to have a flexible work schedule that is going to allow me to be in the studio making work, networking with other artists in my community. Mecca has been great in opening many different avenues for me other than just simply creating my abilities as an artist. I also have created an experimental school inside the ICA here at Mecca called the Peninsula School. It's an experimental school run by students, students aside the curriculum. Anyone can teach, anyone can be a student. Right now we have artwork by Helen Martin. She's a 26 year old British artist and we have a video of hers. We also have artwork by Elad Basri. He's also a recent MFA graduate. So the school is really investigating how these young artists are successful in supporting themselves as a working artist and where are the possibilities for us as Mecca students to achieve that in some time in the future if that's our goal.