About the artist
I’m Cassandra, an artist living and working in Alaska. I am compelled to make work about the things I notice, particularly the things that are easy to overlook. Living in Alaska has given me an endless supply of them: the way the landscape changes with the seasons, the strange contradictions of light and darkness, the isolation and connection that can exist in the same place, and the ways a landscape can become intertwined with the people who live in it.
My work is an exploration of those contradictions. I work primarily with charcoal and watercolor, two mediums that allow me to approach an image from very different directions. Charcoal asks me to look closely. It slows me down and makes observations permanent, drawing attention to texture, expression, and small details. Watercolor is less controlled. It moves, bleeds, and interacts with the paper in ways I cannot always predict. It carries energy and emotion.
I am interested in what happens when those two ways of seeing meet. Much of my work begins with observation, but it rarely ends there. A face, an object, or a landscape can become a starting point for exploring something less tangible: isolation, resilience, vulnerability, belonging, or the complicated emotional experience of living in a place that can be both extraordinarily beautiful and incredibly difficult.
I don't want to dictate what a piece should mean. I want to create enough space for the viewer to bring their own experience to it. For me, making art is an opportunity to slow down and pay attention, to notice what is usually passed over, to explore what I don't yet understand, and to give form to things that can be difficult to put into words.
This is the work I am excited to make, and I’m still figuring out where it will take me.
