I think of my work as an evolutionary companion to my own self-discovery. It began as an interest in family, loss, and the importance of the past, but recently my concepts have developed into both an internal and an external narrative that have gone far afield but which remain shaped by my experiences. My thirst for understanding isn't slaked by considering who we are. I hunger to know why we are. From the smallest atom to the widest expanses, I want answers.

In my desire for those answers I fashion myself as an armchair theoretician – a scientist of sorts who ventures forth, not just to discover answers, but to discover questions. The workings of life and the universe hearken, and I find myself looking for what I can identify as basic constants in our existence.

We've all heard the adage that nothing is certain in this world but death and taxes, but I prescribe to a different narrative. Heraclitus believed that the only constant is change and Thomas Kuhn wrote that paradigm shifts fundamentally alter our entire perspective of reality. What is real for me yesterday may not be real for me tomorrow.

My evolution as an artist has tracked with my evolution as a person. I have changed. My views have changed. My art has changed. But I hope that my work has enough longevity and nuance for people to look at it and take something from it and for those same people to walk through life, change themselves, and then reflect upon it in a different light. I want their interpretation to shift and evolve as they do. I want this because in the end, I think that the act of creating and recreating is at the very heart of being human.

Melissa Hill
2015

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