ARTIST STATEMENT

I was exposed to abnormal yet beautiful shapes, lines, and movements for the first 13 years of my life as a serious ballet student. I did not fully grasp why these elements resonated with me until college, when I took a break from dance. While studying art in Italy for a semester, I realized that it was the interplay of negative and positive space created within dance that I found most compelling. It was then that dance became my ultimate muse.

 

In fall 2021, I moved to New York City to attend graduate school for art therapy. This program exposed me to the direct relationship between emotional, mental, and physical experiences and both the art-making process and final product. Through my coursework and internships, I encountered hundreds of images created in art therapy by clients ranging from children exposed to trauma, to individuals with schizophrenia, to dementia patients, and many others. This exposure inspired me to push the boundaries of my own work.

 

During my studies, I learned about response art—work created by art therapists in reaction to client interactions or course material. I initially found the abstraction in these exercises to feel superficial. As a result, I began incorporating dancers into these pieces, realizing that the emotional intensity expressed through the dancer’s form and physical tension felt more authentic to me than abstraction alone.

 

After October 7, I felt a profound call to make Jewish art and to engage more deeply with my identity through my practice. Through this process, I began to recognize a natural connection between dance and Judaism: we sway while we pray, we dance in celebration and in mourning, and we use the body as a vessel for memory, devotion, and resilience. Dance, which was already central to my work, became a way to explore Judaism as something embodied and lived rather than purely textual.

 

The dancers I depict are reflections of my personal experiences. Much of the work I created during and after graduate school functions as response art, marking pivotal moments in my life. As I continue to grow, my artwork will evolve alongside me, remaining rooted in movement as a language for emotion, spirituality, and identity.