Over the past 3 years or so I have found an immense interest in biological art. Biological art, in my eyes, is the art of utilizing parts of the human body such as hair, finger nails, and other bodily aspects of our anatomy as art. I use this definition because that is what I truly believe the human body is. In every aspect. This thought pattern brought me to developing my first biological art piece. 

About 2 years ago, I was in Dallas, TX and I bought this local tea in this nice glass bottle (see slideshow to the right). I finished the tea and didn't want to get rid of the bottle because it was so nice, so I decided to keep it. At this time, I had already started saving my fingernails here and there whenever one would fall off or I'd cut them, but I never really had a safe place to keep them. While I was in Texas, I had a fingernail ready to come off and nowhere to safely keep it except for the empty glass tea bottle, so, naturally, I decided to toss the fingernail in the bottle for safekeeping. The empty tea bottle then became a designated place for the safekeeping of any and all fingernails and toenails. I set the goal of wanting to fill the whole bottle up with fingernails and toenails. It was placed in my apartment as an art piece and decoration in the meantime, and my roommate and I would add to it each chance we got. Over time as we started to meet more people and have people over to our place, we began getting fingernails and toenail donations from our friends and family. The human nail bottle quickly became more than just a bottle of fingernails and toenails. It became a bottle full of various experiences and places from each person that contributed. The nails hold a lot of experience in themselves, and it became something really beautiful to think about. My dream is to continue getting nails from all the people that come into our lives and for the bottle to represent all of the experiences that the nails hold from each person. In my mind, each nail has a different story. 

This project still has many years to go, and I am sure it will change with time, but for now, we are still accepting and encouraging fingernail and toenail donations from any and all.