Blood on the Walls:
Domination and Violence

The concepts of my photography work in this current series, “Blood on the Walls”, stems from exploring the ideas of how male psychological intimidation and dominance effect the female psyche, which recently has evolved into a more disturbing and personal outlook on domestic violence.

I use the female body and face in the majority of my work, but for this current body of work, I have completely omitted the subject. In place of a portrayal of a facial or corporal physique I use blood as a form of libidinal essence and a human stain. This alludes to the forensic trace elements depicted in the images. These scenes are inspired by real and imaginary crime scenes and uncanny presences. Something happened in the space, more specifically, a violent incident happened or perhaps the pictorial construct creates the violence. This relates to the idea of the artist as the creator of signs that trigger the reaction to the audience.

As a woman who has personally experienced forms of abuse in a domestic relationship, I create visual crime scenes that can be interpreted as foreshadowing my own demise. I use a variety of methods to create the images, both analog and digital processes of distortion, to create an unsettling image of transparent layers to tell a unified biographical and fictional story.

A repeated medium in this series is my own blood splatter, as well as a mixture of paint and ink to create the viscosity of real blood. I photograph the mixed media and lay it over images of mundane empty rooms. Text is also used in my work to project a dominant voice. These words or phrases are from real encounters I have had at some of the most terrifying moments of my life. This work helps me personally cope with psychological trauma in the past but also directly highlights the issue of domestic violence.