making space

After a tumultuous year, Colleen was compelled to create Things That Scare Meas a humorous release for the anxiety that has been building over the course of 2020. After a period of lackluster creativity during the summer quarantine months, Colleen decided to jump right back into her artistic practice by trying something completely new and out of her comfort zone. After experimenting with paint pens, Colleen found that building tiny, colorful, 4”x4” worlds became almost therapeutic. By experimenting with bold colors and following a loose set of rules, she was able to put aside aesthetic expectations that she held for herself and focus on the process of creating rather than the end result. Although Things That Scare Me started as a form of escapism, her approach eventually turned more serious. Through this series, she was able to translate feelings of being overwhelmed onto the physical space of a canvas. Using intuition, Colleen created complexity in the individual works by adding details and patterns from which she would typically shy away. After a long period of creative drought, Things That Scare Me was a liberating work to create.