In Light of COVID Series

Artist Statement

 

For years, I have worked in studio as an assemblage sculptor.  My gathered objects, lexicons of symbolic imagery, together in surreal juxtapositions have informed my work on a visceral level.  My choice of objects is often inspired by words and phrases, which allow me to layer information throughout every aspect of my work.  The resulting artwork is a type of sight poem.  

 

My signature work started with small canvases, paint and the landscape.  Long days of looking and analyzing the subtle and not so subtle movements of light and shadow.  Watching the play of color and texture as the land breathes in the morning mist, and exhales the evening heat. Trees in particular have always fascinated me.  Marking the landscape, these monuments so solid and quiet, are archetypes of resolve.  Their form and surface relate to an internal topography.

 

Sometimes, there are chapters in life that serve as emotional freeze points.   As an artist, these periods can be initially devastating, serving to shut down the creative process.  COVID has created such an occasion.  My first inclination was to go back to the land, when in reality that was all I could see anyway.  I found myself in places so transcendent, I sensed I had become an interloper witnessing a conversation between the Creator and the created.  So, I lingered there and allowed the quiet wisdom, strength, and solitude to console me.  

 

These sculptures reflect the spiritual dialogue that took place between the land and my anxious soul; they call upon the nature of joy and freedom, and the patina of wisdom that embraces us over time.