My work centers on the People’s Beach at Riis Beach in New York City, a queer, trans and BIPOC haven increasingly threatened by climate change and coastal development. Using scanner-based imaging, I examine the microcosm of coastal flora. I see symbiotic systems of care existing in seaside ecologies as parallel to the mutual aid so critically important for queer communities to thrive.
I create sensor-driven, time-based images, queering image making by rejecting the camera lens in favor of electronic capture and direct digital translation. I capture seaweed and Seaside Goldenrod alongside femme detritus left behind by beachgoers, such as false eyelashes and wig hair. The capture process unfolds over long durations, during which movement, touch and light accumulate as detailed data rather than instantaneous capture.
The machine fails to understand my movements, producing rainbow glitches. I understand these errors as records of misrecognition that parallels queer existence. They reflect the anxiety many of us are feeling and serve as reminders of the rainbowed spaces we create, spaces like the People’s Beach that often exist outside the understanding of the patriarchal machine.
In recent works, I also extend this sensor-driven process beyond the shoreline, rendering botanicals grown by queer femme and trans people of all genders in the Hudson Valley and Catskills. These fragmented and rainbowed works reflect collective efforts toward healing and survival, where lives are disrupted, refracted and lived beautifully in ways the machine cannot fully parse.
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