My practice is rooted in drawing—not as a medium, but as a methodology. I understand drawing as an act of claiming space, of preserving ground, of honoring what holds us. The line is my tool of resistance and reclamation. Whether made with charcoal on paper, a paint stick on canvas, or a jigsaw through knotted pine, each mark is a declaration: I am here, and this ground matters.

I draw with my hands, my tools, my body. I carve, burn, stitch, and strike. I make lines with a V-gouge on Baltic birch, with a coping saw to shape a crown, with a die grinder to reveal the contours of a bear skull—or my own face. I write sales signs for meat departments beneath rows of corporate graphics, and I call that drawing too. Because drawing, for me, is not confined to the page or the pedestal. It is a feminist act of refusal—of boundaries, of hierarchies, of the false divisions between craft and fine art, between labor and expression.

My work carries an irreverent disregard for gender norms. I reject the binaries that have long dictated who gets to make, what gets to matter, and how bodies are allowed to take up space. My materials are not passive. They push back. They carry memory, weight, and history. I collaborate with them to build layered compositions that function as psychological landscapes—spaces shaped by trauma, survival, and the ongoing work of healing.

In this way, my practice is both personal and political. It is about reclaiming authorship, honoring the labor of the hand, and expanding what drawing can be. To learn more about my work, check out my artist talk here.

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BIO

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After earning a BA in Sculpture from Brandeis University, Armstrong returned to Texas to complete her MA/MFA in Painting at the University of Dallas in the Spring of 2021. She currently teaches as an adjunct at Collin College and the University of North Texas .