ARTIST STATEMENT
I have been a still life painter of common objects for about 15 years. Periodically I veer off into new directions, exploring other ways to organize my visual thinking. This leads to discovery, confusion, and excitement while creating with less predictable results. Most recently, I felt the need to respond, through my art, to current events and sociological/cultural issues.
In my most recent projects, I begin each piece of art with a question or a hunch. The particular format and technique develop as I attempt to find and, possibly, reveal an answer. Most of this work involves repetition, pattern, and reconfiguration and often is based on a system that has been predetermined.
My process consists of a gestation period where the question/topic looms and then percolates while my visual considerations become clearer. There is often a mathematical or analytical element in designing the system and arriving at the final presentation The challenge has been to find new visual vocabularies and design solutions - to pair the specific question or issue with an approachable and elegant visual format. Having a system that is based on repetition, usually involving a grid of some sort, provides me with a sense of stability and structure - not surprising, as what is at the root of this series of artwork is a need to make sense of our current realities.
In my still life paintings I am drawn to objects of everyday life - boxes, bags, packaging materials, tools, books, bottles, food - forms that have a strong geometric component, that are solid and stable. Depicting them in paint allows me the sheer pleasure of transforming a three-dimensional subject onto a two dimensional surface, with all the formal considerations of composition, rhythm, balance, and technique, as well as the opportunity to portray them as metaphors for universal themes.