Tracing Legends is a body of work involving three large books that hang on the wall as well as two smaller cabinet pieces. The work traces a conversation between my child-self and my adult-self using tales as a medium.

The abstract paintings in this thesis exhibition are about spatial relations deriving from landscapes. Memory, moods, feelings, and intuition, as well as color relations, shapes, expressive brushstrokes, and the paint itself are important elements in achieving the intended meaning and effects. My method involves painting and over-painting, changing the painting constantly until it is what I wanted it to become without knowing it in advancea process in which the painting eventually becomes itself by its own volition. But when do I feel my painting is really finished? I feel like an adventurer, a discoverer, when I paint; I want something challenging and rewarding to emerge from my painting. I have to accept a certain mystery about the end of things. I see my art as a search for spiritual meaning and as a way of living, both of which emerge through the energy I expend in its execution.

This work begins with the decorative arts. It is inspired by the seductive color and line of Iznik tile from the Ottoman Empire and the ornate decorative flourishes of 18th. Century Chinoiserie wall paper that depicts fantastic landscapes and fanciful animals. The bears, cats, birds, snakes, and dogs and people dressed in costumes that appear in the tiles are the protagonists of a fairy tale yet to be written. The uses of enchantment are endlessly fascinating. Enchantment fulfills our need for fantasy, beauty, meaning and reassurance. It connects us to the past and equips us to face the present, secure in the knowledge that all's well that ends well.

Discerning Lines of Demarcation is an investigation into the accumulated landscape of distressing times. Situations of mass destruction, loss of family, substance abuse, domestic violence, loss of friendship, and uncertain health have all been encountered within a steady progression in the last five to six years of my life. The digestion of these situations has been slow as the events overlap and intertwine each other. I have tweezed and distilled these circumstances. This is described through different types of terrains that create physical boundaries to represent psychological fears or events. Tied to Your Hate; How Much More Will Fall, Untitled, Loss Can Ruin but Growth Can Be Found, and Precarious Footing are all pieces that reach for a greater understanding of many trying events. The work uses the format of installation as the vehicle in which to articulate the landscapes or yards. This format allows the viewer to be inside the workings of the various pieces.

Traversing landscapes is a body of work that translates my experiences of outdoor travels in the unique and remote places in Louisiana. These experiences are transformed into semi-organic constructions that are derived from forms and materials present in the natural landscape and the forms and materials used to navigate these environments. The materials used exemplify the contrasts and also the connections that exist on the ever-converging paths of mankind and nature. Though the struggle in the relationship between man and nature has always existed though time. It is at present, our time now, that we can see the greatest contrast and the need for a unified relationship.

For the majority of people, video art does not have a major impact on their daily lives. Between ubiquitous television monitors and incessant internet pop-ups, attention paid to a video in an art gallery is passing at best. How can one's video creations make an impression on such an already visually-immersed culture? Video artist Omer Fast, uses editorial effects such as dubbing, mistranslations, and splicing in his documentary-style works to attract the attention of, and later alienate, his audience. This essay analyzes Fast's oeuvre and deconstructs the ways in which he attracts audience interest and subsequently encourages his audiences, through alienation, to become more critical viewers for both his artwork and their daily lives. The application of critical theory, such as Bertolt Brecht's Verfremdungseffekt and Jean Baudrillard's concept of simulacra, add to Fast's editorial effects in order to set him apart from the standard contemporary video artist. Notably, Fast addresses aspects of artist ethics in his work, which ultimately distinguishes him as a unique leader in contemporary art.

The earliest decipherable Chinese history traces back to the Shang Dynasty (B.C. 1766 1154). This period was considered prehistory until the discovery of artifacts describing divination rites in this era, practices that forge a culture. Divination rites included patterns in nature (natural law, li) such as the Five Elements and the Eight Trigrams. The Eight Trigrams were the first attempt at writing ancient philosophies. Eight symbols represent categories that are not static, but the changing patterns in nature are captured by organizing events and forms in nature relative to seven other influences. Later this idea expanded eight-fold, embracing the patterns of nature as well as human nature, thus creating Sixty-four Hexagrams. Such categories illuminating likeness and kind in nature originated in ritualistic practices and were the theoretical foundations of Chinese traditional art and medicine still in practice today. This thesis finds that ancient philosophies and rituals are the roots of Chinese culture, medicine and art. One ancient concept that is still prevalent in medical theories today is that of the body as a microcosm reflecting the macrocosmic universe. Medical concepts about the body illuminate a view of nature based on the concept of largeness in smallness. The technique of depicting things as they are asks artists to capture the likeness of forms in nature. This is a time-honored aim of Chinese artists. Artists should strive to capture likeness representing natures complexity, such that there is largeness in the smallest forms (such as humans) and space in nothingness (such as mist).

My goal for the work documented in this paper was to create and install an immersive multimedia environment, using animation and interactivity to express and communicate ideas drawn from personal experience of how people may meet, influence each other and enrich each others lives. With my projects over the past few years, I learned that sharing personal stories is a powerful tool for communicating with others. The I MET YOU piece provided the perfect opportunity for me to pull together all my thoughts and tell people who have made difference in my life Im so glad I met you. I sought to communicate my appreciation for all those people. I wanted to tell them that who I am today is a function of my meeting and getting to know them here. And at the same time, I have a hope that the audiences who come to see my work can experience my story and think about their own lives and the people who have affected them. My story is not just one persons observation, but perhaps reflections that others may share. I want people to be moved and also stimulate the desire to tell others how they feel about them. Since the main theme of my story is a narrative about growthboth internal and externalthe central animation is flanked by two digital books in which the text, message or meaning expressed on the page changes as the pages are being turned, which is a metaphor for how both we, and our perception of the world itself, changes as we walk in it.

My goal with this body of work was to create an installation that would resemble both a chapel and a shotgun house. The installation was constructed out of mixed media vignettes revealing both memories and constructed commentaries that reflect and document a moment of real time for me. The work I have created over the past several years speaks of human frailty and the mystery of existence. My thesis exhibition has allowed me to further develop my own personal symbols, which serve as fragile reminders of hope and transformation in a hostile world. I have created an environment with an iconic shrine-like quality that allows viewers to reflect upon their relationship with the surrounding environment.

The photographs in my thesis sit between these two movements, leaning more towards the contemporary ideas that were generated by the New Topographic Movement. On one hand, they are similar to the traditional photographs of the landscape, in the way they depict a place of organic beauty. They present a panorama that serves as a poignant reminder of the natural world that demands our respect and appreciation for what it has to offer. At the same time, this cannon of imagery contains man, or a visual representation of man, and his efforts. My pictures are not an outsider's observation of man's influence on the topography, they are all directly related to me and my experience on this nearly 500-acre space. This is a study of my family's home, of my family's existence, of my family's influence and of altering the land. Moreover, it shows how the land tilted our actions. It is meant to suggest the idea of man and nature coexisting in some kind peace. These photographs are new topographic landscapes that document the history of my family, our land, and how the two, like a river winding, have organized the treatment of the other.