Izzy working on finishing her drawing, Lure, in her home studio in Asheville, NC (2023).
"I make art because I always have something on my mind and drawing is the only way that I can seem to quiet my conscience for a moment. Though my work is conceptually based in contemporary research on gender and sexuality as it relates to popular consumer culture, each drawing for me is a sort of recollection of a moment that I've experienced in my life. And that's why the drawing process is so important to me; it allows me to sort through my experiences and reconcile them within the scope of a greater whole."
 "I keep my pastels as unorganized as possible so that I am always looking for a new color, and I also definitely have favorite colors among my palette - but I never write down the number of the color (I like to keep track of the colors by eye - it keeps me sharp). I wear gloves when I work because I use a heavily textured, gritty paper, and the pigment in the pastels is toxic. So, my hands need protection when I'm drawing, because I mainly use my fingers and palm as blending tools to create the smooth gradients and color transitions that you see in my work."
Izzy touching-up Ripe & Reduced after installing her solo exhibition at Revolve Gallery in Asheville, NC (2023).
"Because I work with pastel, sometimes I have to touch up my pieces that are unprotected (I'm talking about my shaped-panel pieces). People ask me a lot about sprayable fixative - I don't use it unless I am planning to ship something a long ways away. I layer my pastels very thickly (this is why I use a textured paper), and because of this, sprayable fixative doesn't have much of an effect on my pieces, other than making them more difficult to touch up before or after installing an exhibition. So I prefer to take my chances and maintain the ability to add pastel whenever I need to, although I do occasionally coat some of my pastel pieces in a pourable resin-based sealant (but that is more expiremental - I haven't nailed that process down yet!)"
