My artwork centers around ideas of life, death, fleeting moments, and memories. I’m inspired by traditional women’s crafts because of the overlap of form and function and the act of making and caring. My studio practice is woven into the balance of my life as an artist and a working mother.

 

My process begins with photography. I document moments of my daily life as a way to remember the range of emotions felt on any given day, event or season. I often feel caught up in the speed of life, especially as a parent, and so photography transcends chaos and pauses life to a still image. I take photos that are grounded in the ideas of celebration, joy, loss and grief. These dynamic subjects compel me because though seemingly opposite, they are inherent to one another.

In my current body of work, photographs are a physical medium. I print, cut, recompose and stitch them together. The sewn works form patterns and become sculptural. The repetitive pairing of images act like memories, overlapping time and space, revealing cycles of life.

 

Originally from Long Island, NY (b. 1976), Jessica received her MFA from UCONN in 2001. Her work has been exhibited at national venues including Artspace, CT, The Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art, CT, The Hudson River Museum, NY, Lehman College, NY, the Fresno Metropolitan Museum, Fresno, CA, and most recently at the Stay Home Gallery in Tennessee. She is the Documentation Photographer at the Yale University Art Gallery where she documents all exhibitions, events, lectures, and a wide variety of supportive PR media. In addition to her museum work, she’s taught various art courses at colleges throughout CT and NY.