Pandemic Art Archive
Artwork created in the background of long reporting days, during a period when headlines explained only part of the story.
The pandemic years brought a level of uncertainty none of us could fully prepare for. While I was reporting, producing, and trying to make sense of the news like everyone else, painting became a way to process what the headlines didn't explain. These pieces were created between 2020 and 2021, often late at night, when the world felt heavy and information moved faster than understanding.
Some of the work reflects the emotional noise of that time: confusion, repetition, and disruption. Others capture moments that steadied me, including women who shaped the national mood in their own way. Together, these paintings form a visual record of how I got through a historic period as both a journalist and a human being. There's no single style or theme here. Just snapshots of a year that demanded resilience, clarity, and constant recalibration.
The Inner World
Pieces that capture the mental and emotional weight of 2020–2021
Confusion (2020)
Painted on December 27 while listening to a documentary about Breonna Taylor. I was working as a digital journalist at the time, trying to understand the details as they unfolded. The piece reflects the fear, questions, and information gaps that shaped that moment.
Mask Up (2021)
Created during the height of pandemic precautions. The face is anonymous by design, reflecting how identity and expression disappeared behind masks while the world adjusted to a new reality.
Untitled Face (2020)
A simplified portrait inspired by one of the men central to the political tension of 2020. The lack of features reflects the election cycle's noise, intensity, and constant presence, without anchoring the piece to any single individual.
Two Untitled Faces (2020)
This pair was painted during the height of the election season. Both figures represent the dominant political personalities shaping the national conversation at the time. They’re intentionally left featureless and unnamed to focus on the atmosphere of that moment rather than the individuals.
The Noise
Work shaped by repetition, overload, and the steady hum of uncertainty
Left-Handed Dots (2020)
Painted entirely with my left hand. I started left-handed as a child, but my Jamaican mother insisted I switch, tying my left hand behind my back until I learned to write with my right. During the pandemic, I chose to paint this piece with the hand I wasn't allowed to use. The repetition and rhythm became a way to steady my mind during days that felt unpredictable.
Dot Panel – Green and Yellow (2020)
A gradient built from hundreds of dots. The structure and repetition mirror how each day blurred into the next.
Soundwave Streaks (2020)
My first painting of the pandemic. I made it on a night filled with nonstop news alerts, trying to capture the pace and disruption of breaking stories through horizontal strokes. A journalist friend encouraged me to start painting again after I said supplies felt too expensive. Their advice was simple: start small and keep going. This piece is where that return to art began.
270 Electoral Points – November 5, 2020
Created during the prolonged vote count after the 2020 presidential election. By November 5, the country had gone two whole days without a projected winner.
Working as an MMJ at the CBS affiliate in St. Petersburg/Tampa, the team spent those days tracking every update from the swing states still counting, primarily Arizona, Georgia, Nevada, and Pennsylvania, while monitoring how Florida's results shaped early narratives. Florida reported its totals quickly on election night, and the state's outcome influenced national expectations and how viewers interpreted the path to 270.
โ
The newsrooms across the country focused on explaining mail-in ballot delays, county-level shifts, and the hour-by-hour changes to the electoral map. The uncertainty stretched far beyond a typical election night.
โ
This piece reflects the tension of that week, the steady flow of numbers, the pressure to communicate evolving information clearly, and the collective pause as the nation waited for a result that would not come quickly.
Foghorn (2020)
โ
This piece is named after the Foghorn fern I bought during the pandemic. This plant became popular on social media as people searched for anything that brought comfort, routine, or life into their homes. I was working at WTSP in St. Petersburg at the time, reporting through a nonstop cycle of breaking updates, health briefings, and shifting narratives. The news felt loud, constant, and impossible to step away from.
โ
The fern became a small counterbalance to all of that, something quiet to take care of while the world stayed unpredictable. The bursts of color in this painting mirror the intensity of that year. Still, they also reflect the grounding moments I found in simple things.
โ
When I left St. Pete, I gifted the fern to one of my favorite bakers in Gulfport, leaving a piece of that period with someone who brought joy to the community. This painting holds both the noise of the moment and the calm I tried to create inside it.
The Shift
Work that signals grounding, rebuilding, and small moments of clarity.
Shattered Glass (2020)โ
A mixed-media collage built from discarded fabric layered into a new shape.
I created this piece at a time when long-buried family secrets were surfacing, not just in my world but in many households. The pandemic's isolation left people alone with memories they had long pushed aside. Without the usual distractions, painful truths had nowhere else to go.
The fragmented pieces in this work reflect that reality: the breaking open, the courage it took for people to finally speak their trauma out loud, and the slow, deliberate process of rebuilding something more substantial from what was once hidden.
It's a piece about what breaks us, and the resilience that follows when truth finally comes into the light.
Wray & Nephew Bottle Cap (2021)
โ
A small object study built around the bottle cap from Wray & Nephew, a rum that sits in many Caribbean households. I painted it to document a reality I saw everywhere during the pandemic: people drinking more than usual as a way to cope with isolation, stress, and uncertainty.
โ
I was part of that pattern too, relying on an extra pour more often than I expected. The circles echo repetition and routine, and the bright colors point back to cultural comfort and familiar rituals.
โ
Since then, I've limited my own drinking to just a few glasses a month, if that, a shift that came with more clarity and steadier grounding.
The Women Who Carried Us
Tributes to the women whose presence shaped a national moment
Amanda Gorman (2021)
Painted after watching her deliver “The Hill We Climb” at the inauguration. Her presence that day represented clarity and hope after a long, heavy year.
Vice President Harris (2021)
Created in the days following the inauguration.
The colors behind her reflect the weight and energy of her historic moment.
Michelle Obama (2021)
A steady, confident presence during the inauguration.
The bold colors reflect the grounded strength she brought into that moment and every moment before and after.
