Projects
The Price of Paradise
The Price of Paradise is an ongoing documentary project exploring the houseless issue on the islands of Hawai'i. This series aims to force viewers to notice that which they typically bypass and to humanize the individuals that are often ignored.
While there are many important issues that deserve attention on the island of O'ahu, there has always been something that has not sat well with me during my travels; which is the treatment of the houseless population in Hawai'i.
The islands have one of the largest populations of unhoused people, though it is not often discussed in favor of tourist opinions of the islands. It is particularly difficult for me to see them in this setting, this place where so much money is funneled in - but it is not going to the locals, native Hawaiians or the houseless population.
During my most recent trip, I noticed that the unhoused population is largely ignored by tourists and residents alike; they are often overlooked as people rush past them with surf boards, food or bags from luxury stores that line the streets right beside Waikiki beach.
An incident that particularly caused upset within me was watching a couple get photos together while an unhoused person slept right behind their photographer, and he was never acknowledged.
This series aims to humanize the individuals that are often dehumanized due to their housing status. In most of the portraits, the faces of the individuals are obscured to ensure that they are not made a spectacle during moments of distress - but the faces of people who are experiencing joy, community or calm are shown to remind the viewers that as with any human, unhoused people experience these moments as well.
I hope to produce enough portraits in this series to provide a full gallery experience in the coming years.
Performance is Futile
Performance is Futile is a self-portrait series exploring the intersection of chronic illness, gendered expectations, and societal performance. Styled as a sorrowful mime under harsh blue lighting in a basement, the series evokes themes of isolation, exhaustion, and resistance.
Created in the aftermath of a Multiple Sclerosis diagnosis and a traumatic workplace experience, the project rejects the expectation that women must keep performing through pain; smiling, working, surviving, regardless of personal or systemic suffering. Through theatrical poses, distorted expressions, and symbolic references (like jazz hands, forced smiles, and over-the-shoulder tension), the work becomes a personal and political rebellion.
This is not a cry for sympathy. It is a declaration:
I will not perform. I will exist.
Because performance; in the face of oppression, illness, and dismissal, is not strength. It’s erasure. And I refuse to disappear.