Turning 40 and looking at popular culture and contemporary women celebrities, I began to ask questions. What do these women represent to the younger generation? What are they teaching them about what it means to be a woman? How are these manufactured personalities different than the ones that Gen X grew up with? With these thoughts came nostalgia.

I began a journey into my childhood memory and started to think deeply about what I was looking at as a child. What messages were the pop stars I was looking at sending into my young mind? What were they teaching me about what it would mean to be a woman?

In my mind, these women I was looking at in the eighties were stronger and more diverse in age, looks and colour. These women were pushing gender boundaries (i.e.,. Annie Lennox / Grace Jones) and Queen Latifah is standing strong, Afrocentric, and body positive.

I realized, that I learned a lot from these women, and I began to paint them. As I was painting, I reflected on those distant fuzzy memories of seeing them on Much Music, going to their concerts, and reading about them in teen magazines. What had they taught me? This series on glass represents those TV screens and, in turn, the iPhone and computer screens we look at now. I invite the viewer to look through this personal homage and reflect on how culture has changed, and how the messaging has regressed: what are they looking at?