From the outside, many decisions made by someone living with obsessions and compulsions appear ordinary. Internally, they rarely feel that way. Even the smallest choice can carry an all-or-nothing quality, as though there is one correct path and every other possibility exists in opposition to it. The stakes often have little to do with the decision itself. They come from the feeling attached to it.

The logic of OCD is often internally consistent while existing completely outside objective reality. It becomes a private system of meaning, where safety and danger are defined less by what is happening than by what the body believes is happening. What feels “right” isn’t necessarily what is true. It’s what briefly restores a sense of equilibrium.

Making artwork about this feels strangely ironic. I think many people with OCD spend much of their lives trying to keep their compulsions contained. There are invisible boundaries - certain places where OCD is allowed to exist, and others that are kept separate from it. For me, the studio has often been one of those places. It’s where I could step outside these patterns of thinking.

Bringing OCD into the work disrupts that refuge. I'm choosing to speak directly about something that has remained largely invisible. There is discomfort in that, but there is also honesty. If the work asks viewers to confront uncertainty, vulnerability, or contradiction, then it feels important that I am willing to do the same.