STATEMENT OF WORK

In this body of work, I am exploring the duality of subject and background as it can represent relations of self and the embracing world. My painting mode hovers between direct representation and abstraction. It juggles the fictional and material aspects of painting.  This junction between the material properties of the paint and its illusionistic possibilities is the zone that most fascinates me. When does a swath of paint become ‘something’?

I utilize forms from nature that invite the viewer into abstraction, such as crystals, marine forms, roots and branches of a tree, or horizon line. The prickly exterior of a sea urchin and the delicacy of uni, the patience of a predator following the spoor of the victim and the spurt of violence in the action of attack, the lightness of a breeze and the heaviness of humidity, the micro and macro relationship of the human body to ecosystem are all present in this body of work. I am attempting to convey feelings without direct representation, inviting the viewer into an uncertain and eerie landscape where things feel both real and alchemical. The scale discrepancy between the real subject and the painted subject is an important factor in creating uncertainty, alienation, eeriness, and the imaginary.  The paintings often consist of a single subject centrally placed in a dark field of color with an emphasis on an absence of the human form combined with an esoteric or hidden way of expression that asks the question – are you the one observing or are you being observed?