Artist Statement
What Goes Bump in the Night
Throughout my life, I’ve always experienced anxiety. As an adult, this exhibits itself through difficulties interacting with people, or worrying about phone calls. As a child however, my fears were more nebulous due to my overactive imagination. Like most children, my fears were of the dark, strangers, or ghosts. Using these experiences as inspiration, I chose to personify various anxieties I remember from my childhood as horrific monsters. These monsters each represent different fears or experiences from my own childhood. I chose to illustrate them this way to give viewers an opportunity to experience how I felt throughout a childhood of overthinking.
My series maintains several hallmarks of the style I’ve developed during my time at Seneca College, however thematically I chose to embrace horror imagery. It was important to me to marry the style I’ve built at Seneca, one of flat shapes and bold colors, with the horror art I created before college. In doing so, I believe that I am working towards my truest self as an artist.
Each piece in my series features a scene split in two. One part is dominated by a monster, while the other has the child. In each of the images, the monsters’ hands are breaching the threshold, and entering the child’s world.
Each of my pieces was created on illustration board in mixed media. I used gouache, ink and pencil crayon for small line details. I used a dry brush technique to create texture, and scumbling to create a foreboding vignetting effect in some of the pieces.