As children, my brother and I couldn’t wait to disappear into the world of Silwana after school. It was an imagined world woven through the garden: a network of families, neighbourhoods and characters, each with their own stories and relationships. Creating Silwana became a way of making sense of the world around me — expressing, questioning and exploring what I observed and learned. Some of my favourite experiences were when others joined in and the world grew beyond what I could have imagined alone.

 

Growing up often means losing touch with that instinctive sense of curiosity and play. Yet I have found myself wanting to return to it again and again.

 

Within the complex and challenging tides of art school, I found myself reaching for the first few building blocks of new worlds. Like Silwana, these worlds give me a space to process what I encounter as an adult: the contradictions, questions and uncertainties of the world around us.

 

My work is an invitation to enter through curiosity and play. I believe that these qualities — alongside care, empathy and imagination — are not things we necessarily need to outgrow. They may be some of the things we need most.