Witches, Saints, and Hysterics
Witches, Saints, and Hysterics Across centuries, women who lived too boldly, too fiercely, or too strangely were branded with names meant to contain them: witch, saint, hysteric. These portraits reclaim those words and turn them into fuel. Each painting is a love letter to an unflinching women who refused to be made small. They are reverent, irreverent, and a little uncanny in their celebration of strength and vulnerability. Together, they honor the truth that survival is at once fierce and tender.
The idea for this series had been percolating for years but snapped into focus as I watched my own government escalate its attacks on women’s autonomy and agency. At the same time, a cancer diagnosis put me face to face with my mortality, challenging me to meet my changing body with compassion. Out of this collision of the personal and the political came Witches, Saints, and Hysterics. These paintings were made slowly, with patience and defiance, asking viewers to consider the power we grant to names and the truths that always slip beyond them.
The women featured have all kinds of different stories. Some are women in my life, like my cousin Kelly and my daughter Eli. Marie sent me her photo after I put out a call for source material online, inviting submissions from women who resonated with the vision of this work. Others are drawn from history – a few are famous for rejecting the oppressive norms of their time, while others are anonymous women photographed in institutions where they were restrained and silenced. Their lives differ, but they are bound by a common courage: the audacity to be fully themselves in a world that demands compliance. To me, they each are all of us.