ROOTS, LINKS & LINEAGE:
FROM RAILROAD SQUARE TO CONGO SQUARE
In May 2024, two EF-2 tornados tore through Railroad Square and destroyed my first public art installation scattering both my work and my spirit. What followed was a yearlong journey of recovery. Through walking, through jazz music, and through painting — I began to gather the pieces of myself back together. Art became my way of finding sanctuary, reimagining resilience, and reclaiming my artistic voice.
My spiritual journey carried me from the destruction at Railroad Square to the sacred grounds of New Orleans, and into conversations with the trees on my daily walks. The Live Oaks—so high, so wide, so deep—taught me endurance and community. Their roots, trunks, and branches carry stories across centuries, connecting generations in cycles of continuity. In them, I found shelter, safety, and the deep lineage of ancestors who, like the trees, shepherd and sustain us.
In my work, trees are both metaphor and guide—suspended sanctuaries where spirits gather to heal, where ancestors and descendants meet, where cultural memory is preserved. My figurative pieces draw inspiration from Congo Square in New Orleans, where on Sundays enslaved Africans and Free People of Color once drummed, danced, and communed beneath the trees. These works honor that rhythm and resilience, while my abstract compositions echo the syncopation of jazz, layered textures, and gestural brushstrokes that create a visual “music” that invites you to explore, heal and grow.
Over the past year, my art from this body of work has been recognized in juried shows across the country: The Art of Jazz (Berks Arts, PA), Into the Woods (Webster Arts, MO), Sounds Like Art (NEXT Gallery, CO), The Seed and the Sower (We Are the Arts, NC), Creative Tallahassee (Council on Culture & Arts, FL) and Art & Soul (Webster Arts, MO)—where my piece La Negressa Amarilla en Havana was awarded Best in Show.
Roots, Links & Lineage is the story of my journey: from destruction to rebirth, from silence to song, from scattering to re-membering. These works invite viewers to listen to the geographies beneath our feet, and to find healing in the oasis of roots, links, and lineage that connect us all.
