This is my most recent piece called "Breathe" it was created with my daughter in mind. It was selected from over 100 other pieces and displayed in "Dual Meaning" in the Liberal Art Gallery at Boise State University in March. It was most recently selected for the "Student Juried Art Show" and will be displayed in two weeks at the Student Union Gallery. Below is the Artist Statement that goes with it.

The body is a complicated apparatus; the ease at which lungs take in oxygen every second of everyday is taken for granted by many. There is no thought involved in breathing, it happens naturally during sleep, exercise, work and play. Lungs easily expand as air fills them and contract as air is emptied. Try to imagine fifty pounds of weight setting on your chest or a pair of hands squeezing your lungs so tight that you cannot take a deep breath. At this point, breathing is no longer occurring without thought; it has now become a struggle. Your lips and fingernail beds begin to turn blue and your body now has to decide whether to breathe or swallow. This is what an asthmatic experiences every day of their life. An asthmatic relies on daily medications to keep their airways open, allowing air to move in and out freely. Without this medication, death is imminent. This necklace is made out of empty medicine vials; vials, that at one time were filled with the very medicine that has saved my daughter’s life. The medical tubing that the vials hang from is the very tubing that my daughter must inhale her medication through. The blue beads represent the color of her lips and nail beds from lack of oxygen. The necklace hangs over the lungs as a talisman.