My work is a love letter to the ocean and a reclamation of the Paua, a creature whose life is spent cloaked in a weathered, rugged exterior, only to reveal its beautiful colours in the silence of its passing. I have always been moved by this quiet tragedy: that beauty so often requires an end to be seen....as an artist I seek to subvert that cycle. I believe that art must protect what it celebrates and by marrying the structural gravity of hydrostone with the fluid light of mixed-media, I aim to capture the shell’s organic luminosity while the spirit remains whole. As a mother, I feel that Motherhood and artistry share a single heartbeat: the drive to protect what we cherish. Through my work, I show my children how to seek the light beneath the surface and to move through life with the courage to follow whatever sets their souls on fire