I make work at the crossroads of art, design, science, and technology. I move between traditional, digital, and emerging media, and I’m drawn to one question in particular: how can visual communication take a complicated idea and turn it into something people actually feel, question, and want to engage with? Typography, photography, motion, interactive media, and spatial design are the tools I reach for, and I’m happiest when I’m experimenting and finding connections between fields that seem to have nothing to do with each other.
A lot of my research starts with ideas that are hard to see or hard to understand. In my work on genetically modified organisms, I explore identity, transformation, and how we relate to the natural world. Through photography, familiar fruits and organisms take on unexpected forms, and carefully arranged typography adds another layer of information. At first glance the compositions look recognizable. Look closer, and the combinations turn unsettling, which raises the question of what is natural and what has been altered. I hope viewers come away seeing familiar things differently, along with the biological, cultural, and technological systems behind them. My collaboration with the Eastman School of Music took a different angle on the same challenge. We asked whether visual metaphors could help people understand musical concepts, bringing together design, sound, and education.
I’m especially excited about where experiential and interactive design is going. As communication moves back and forth between physical and digital spaces, there is a real chance to make work that people take part in rather than just look at. Motion, interaction, environmental graphics, and new technologies let a visual experience unfold over time, through space, and with the audience’s participation. That possibility shapes how I make my own work and how I teach.
At the heart of all of it is a simple belief: design should spark curiosity and draw people in. I value experimentation, collaboration across disciplines, and the willingness to look at a familiar problem from an unexpected angle. Whether I’m building an identity system, an interactive experience, or an exhibition, I think of design as a process of discovery, one that ties together research, visual expression, and the human experience.