2016

Resident Evil 2 (2004)

ambition (2019)

when bailey and i first moved to philly he would talk to me about what i understood as a connection between metaphor and ambition. ambition being a construction rooted in false ideals, false equivocations, and ultimately worthless at producing anything. from that point forward i was convinced that my ‘goals’ needed to be divided into two sections, those that were pragmatic and revolved around money, and those that were more closely tied to whatever impulse i had to produce ‘work’.

an aside, i’m only capable of producing duplicities. in undergrad my thesis similarly divided practice into two parts, the per formative laborer (idealistically subversive) and the hermetic designer, leeching off other artists to spur production. this conceptualization of my practice continued to evolve as i moved to philadelphia, even keeping my practice under the name ‘Expressions of Doubt’. Ultimately i began full time employment at GrayBits after freelancing for a year. This fulfilled one half of my concept, leaving the other to be filled with projects that would require new collaborators. ultimately i fell back into doing freelance work out of habit. at first i horribly under priced projects to make them feel more ‘collaborative’ but then eventually built up prices to a point where it felt like i the compensation was fair (after all i was simply acting the part of a web designer/developer).

in the last couple months i realized this was simply a manifestation of the former, an insecurity i had about my financial stability if i left GrayBits, and an insecurity about whether i could find work with my current technical skill set. my only ambition currently to prove i won’t be broke.

it seems strange to think of this as metaphor but that’s all it really is. i’ve never experienced poverty so i’m afraid of the shame my mother associates with it. it also makes my question the integrity of any motivations i had to somehow produce a duplicitous model of practice as

both sides were ultimately just a reaction to a singular fear.

i’ve been holding onto this feeling for some time, but it feels like i need to articulate something to move my mind forward onto something else. 2020 feels like it holds something new, and i’m excited to see how things continue to change.