"Your Eyes Only" is something I'm genuinely excited about, and it's probably one of my favorite things I've ever created. While working on this book, I was in my happy zone, experiencing the kind of creative groove I hadn't felt in many, many years.
I've wanted to release a book that truly represents me for a long time. People had been pressing me to create a book for literal years- a near decade. Several publishers even reached out offering to help but it often came with limitations and I couldn't quite find my voice within the process. I felt hindered because there was a constant pressure for my work to conform to the industry's cookie-cutter expectations or to center the book around an art style I'd long since evolved from. In my earlier freelancing days, I was told that everything had to be polished and follow a specific style.
As a little girl I used to cut up fashion magazines, wallpaper samples, textiles and anything else I could get my hands on to make paper dolls and collage art. I wanted to somehow capture the spirit of my youth in this project. Naturally, A singular artwork on a white page simply wouldn't do for something like this. I wanted it to feel as though I was pulling from my catalogue of works and compositing them onto the pages the way I see them in my mind when I'm recalling them, like a mood board. My approach is pretty intuitive and organic so this made the most sense in terms of somehow making my internal creative thought process more tangible for observers of my work.
"Your Eyes Only" was my attempt to break free from the self-imposed box I had confined myself to for so long. Of course, I made sure to include some fan favorites, but I also wanted to create something that my younger self would've loved – something frivolously girly, Fashion forward, unapologetically pink, and a bit chaotic.
This book serves as my visual representation of what's been going on in my head, how I see the world, and how I express myself – through a riot of colors, textures, and a lot of noise. "Your Eyes Only" is just me being myself on paper, and I hope you enjoy it as much as I did creating it.
