Some of my earliest memories are of things I cannot see. There has always been a connection between color and loss for me because of a genetic inability to see certain colors. The lack of color information from being color blind, invokes a daunting loss of memory and an inability to hold on to relationships.
I began this work by breaking down and breaking apart color tests; matching colors and using keys to decipher how they work. I adhere circular cut-outs of paint swatches on plexi-glass panels to create the imagery based on old photographs and/or my memory of an event. I use the swatches because the absurdity of the paint names touches on the idea of color definition. These names, however “factual” they may be, have no meaning to me.
Much of the subject matter within my color blind work is based on photographs (my own and appropriated) of my personal relationships. Unlike the basic imagery used in actual color tests (i.e. sailboats)—my subject matter deals more with the less definable imagery of my memories, and the fear and loss associated with the act of remembering. By filling in parts of the image, it becomes lost to the color-blind viewer. The plexi-glass allows the work to create a secondary image through shadow on the wall which both I and the viewer see in the same way.
