A self-portrait, a woven tale of the story I have told to the world through my actions. Each thread connected to another and another until the fabric of my own life reveals what I cannot see through my own eyes. The true nature of being human with all its struggles, questioning, doubt, paths not taken and those I wish I hadn’t becomes a pattern. From those patterns I create the story I wear. This piece depicts my own quest for healing, a continuous battle with figuring out who I am, why I am here and why my life has taken me where it has. When the threads of violence, rape, tumour, pain, grief are mixed with ones of joy, birth, celebration, Spirit, and laughter an entire garment, full of life, to be wrapped up in and kept warm with emerges. It is beautiful inside and out, a wholeness which I can now see, touch and wear proudly because I survived the tale to tell it.

Amanda was born in The Pas, Manitoba. She grew up playing hockey, being one of the boys and has spent most of her life in or underwater. Healing through art is the driving force behind her work with a longing to understand what it means to be human. Her designs are based on experience, the body a canvas for expression and map of her life. She enjoys the ongoing process of peeling back layers to reveal her true self. Life has taken her to studies in Nursing, Spirituality, Dance and Travel, as far away as Rwanda, all of which inform her work.