Delicate Realms: A Return To Self, BLIFTD Studios, Baltimore
Cave Painting I and accompanying visual poem parenthesis are mixed media portraits of grief, illness, desire, and survival— from which bodily reality is unraveled, then clarified into a deeper embodiment of surrender and co-creativity (living) again and again. Like a sequin, the imagined line between sparkle and stasis, ecstasy and abjection, algorithm and nature— dissolves under shifting light.
Cave Painting I, 2025. Mixed media digital composition, embroidery, and beads on cotton, 24″x48″
parenthesis, 2025. Poetry and human hair composition on risograph print, 11″x17″
Image description: A triptych featuring a floating, white, cotton tapestry in the center, hanging by clear wire 2 inches from the wall, with two smaller risograph prints pinned on either side. Composed of printed black and magenta computer symbols with overlaid embroidery and beadwork, a humanoid figure laying on a pillow features a large gash resembling a cave or portal that opens from their forehead down to their limbs, which appear glued together. Inside the gash is a large “at” symbol, from which a magenta cord reminiscent of guts snakes down and out of the figure to surround it in a protective fashion. The two risograph prints feature the same poem composed in the shape of the artist’s right index finger print, printed inversely in black and red ink. The borders feature a pattern created by scanned clumps of their hair.
Cave Painting I, 2025. Mixed media digital composition, embroidery, and beads on cotton, 24″x48″
Image description: Close-up of the tapestry figure in Cave Painting I. The ASCII (American Standard Information Interchange) vernacular served as an accessible art style for the artist to continue to create while being unable to draw through physical incapacitation, and to mimic their hand’s mark-making as if they were drawing.
parenthesis, 2025. Poetry and human hair composition on risograph print, 11″x17″
Image description: risograph prints of a poem composed by the artist in the shape of their right index finger print. The border features a pattern created by scanned clumps of their hair. The image on the left features black text on a white background with a red-tinted border and the image on the right features the inverse, though modified; red text on a white background with a pulsing red hue in the middle of the poem, mimicking blood or blush. A black border surrounds the image. Plain text version of parenthesis and audio can be accessed below.
Cave Painting I: detail shots (top, middle, and bottom)
Image descriptions: (top) detail shot of top third of the tapestry figure, (middle) detail shot of the middle third of the tapestry figure, and (bottom) detail shot of the bottom third of the figure.
Cave Painting I: detail shot and original digital composition
Image description: (Left) detail shot of torso of the tapestry figure. (Right) screenshot of a the original digital image created using the ASCII style, which uses computer keyboard characters to create complex images.
Cave Painting I: close-up shots
Image description: (Left) close-up detail shot of pink embroidery thread sewn to mimic forward slashes and shiny pink and white beads sewn on top of printed characters on white cotton fabric. White cylindrical beads are sewn radially in the shape of a flower between two parentheses. (Right) close-up detail shot of black forward and backward slashes inside the tapestry figure, bordering white embroidery thread, and shiny white, black, and pink beads sewn on top of the printed characters on white cotton fabric.
Video descriptions: Close-ups of the tapestry figure in Cave Painting I of sequins and beads sparkling under gallery lights.
Artist talk audio and transcript available upon request (originally given in October and December 2025).