Artist Statement
I create because, as the painter Mark Rothko put it, "Art
to me is an anecdote of the spirit, and the only means of making concrete the
purpose of its varied quickness and stillness". I feel a constant energy to attempt to make concrete the quickness and stillness of my own spirit.
Painting, for me, is a very emotional act; in fact all creative acts are emotional acts for me. It is about going into myself and bringing forth something physical in response to emotions. I have been working on landscapes, with a focus on colors, textures, and light, for some time now, because I view them to be the best vehicles to explore emotions. As I am painting, I allow my emotions to play across and create the landscapes. I react through the landscapes to what is going on in my life, to the things that inspire, frighten and amaze me. Essentially, my paintings are a transfiguration of my life: everything I am influenced by, and everything that is happening to me I attempt to elevate through the act of painting.
I am particularly interested in beauty, how we can be open to it, how we experience it daily. It is this poetry of day-to-day life that I am constantly trying to discover in my work. By exploring in my paintings and drawings the subtle (though sometimes intense) currents and emotions that run through my life, I hope I may inspire others to become aware of their own emotions, and thus be open to the beauty and poetry in their lives.
'Beauty is truth, truth beauty,-that is all
Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know.'
-John Keats, Ode to a Grecian Urn
Painting, for me, is a very emotional act; in fact all creative acts are emotional acts for me. It is about going into myself and bringing forth something physical in response to emotions. I have been working on landscapes, with a focus on colors, textures, and light, for some time now, because I view them to be the best vehicles to explore emotions. As I am painting, I allow my emotions to play across and create the landscapes. I react through the landscapes to what is going on in my life, to the things that inspire, frighten and amaze me. Essentially, my paintings are a transfiguration of my life: everything I am influenced by, and everything that is happening to me I attempt to elevate through the act of painting.
I am particularly interested in beauty, how we can be open to it, how we experience it daily. It is this poetry of day-to-day life that I am constantly trying to discover in my work. By exploring in my paintings and drawings the subtle (though sometimes intense) currents and emotions that run through my life, I hope I may inspire others to become aware of their own emotions, and thus be open to the beauty and poetry in their lives.
'Beauty is truth, truth beauty,-that is all
Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know.'
-John Keats, Ode to a Grecian Urn
