I make art because I firmly believe it has the power to help make the world better. I want to be aware and acknowledge those whom society has wronged and history has hidden, because Western culture is unjust, but it doesn’t have to be.

My work addresses social and political issues, most recently by exploring my roles as an artist living in a particular community and as a father. Visually, I work with animation and the written word in large-scale indoor and outdoor projections.

My family and I live a very comfortable, white, middle-class life. I want to remind myself and teach my children that not everyone has the advantages that we do and that others have to struggle in ways that we can’t fully understand, simply because of the color of their skin, the person they love, the country they are from, systems that fight against them, and the heavy weight of history, just to name a few. They deserve our understanding and allyship. I want my children to recognize when our systems are unfair and fight to end them.

I have found that my own writing can’t say well enough what I want to express, so I have happily turned to the writings of those who are much more eloquent than I am and use their text in my work. As my friend and artist Billy Renkl has said, “I’ll take my authority any way I can get it, thank you very much.”