Herculaneum

My Herculaneum Series began in 2019, at the onset of the pandemic, when the sudden separation from friends and family deeply impacted me. Through this series, I sought to capture the fragility of life and the striking connections that can exist between people across nineteen centuries. The imagery in these paintings offers an abstract reflection of Herculaneum as it remains today, and the once-thriving community lost to the eruption of Mt. Vesuvius in 79 CE. Drawing inspiration from the colors and architectural layouts of buildings at the Archaeological Park of Herculaneum, I also added graffiti imagery that has been meticulously catalogued by the Ancient Graffiti Project. My technique includes thick underpainting, scratching, and slicing into diverse materials, echoing the marks left by tools at an archaeological excavation.