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fine art
statement
- Two recent series, In Search of a
Landscape and Souvenirs bring to the
forefront abstracted landscape elements
in my work. From the beginning, I have
challenged myself to confront the cliche
theme of "easy listening" landscape
genre. In order to make good
contemporary landscape art, I believe
my paintings must explore the subject of
artistic transformation and ways of
making an age old painting tradition
fresh and original. I make my landscape
landscape tradition.
The primary focus of my landscapes draw from an interest in relationships between
multiple sources of imagery. The content of my work comes from my plein-air painting
investigations, collaged photographs of the landscape that I have taken over the
years, as well as my use of the medium of collage as a vehicle for exploring and
inventing composition. I often group landscape-oriented images from a variety of
sources to create fascinating relationships and meanings.
My work has always been about an expression of the embodiment of a duality
between technique and imagery. They are both important elements of my work. My
plein-air paintings are thickly painted, direct observations of nature. Though
representational in imagery, they have important abstract qualities that embody a
duality between paint and imagery. In the studio, my paintings often begin as an
abstract color field with overpainted imagery that outlines classical landscapes. The
technique is a subtractive one combined with additive painterly approaches. This
subtractive painting method unifies disparate imagery and creates dramatic
modulations of color and space. Through the use of oil paint, together with a wide
variety of rich painterly techniques, my work obtains a physical presence of surface
that underscores the beauty of the painted surfaces. My work exhibits a sense of
fusion in that I do not make distinctions between paint and imagery.
Format plays an important role in my work. My recent series draw from my interest in
developing multiple works in series using common images that allow for a broad
range of compositional and stylistic variations. The diptych and triptych oil on canvas
combinations are an expression of this multiplicity. The small oils on paper and
canvas, Souvenirs, are meant to be seen as a large, multiple installation of similar or
repeating motifs. Painterly passages alternate with the hard-edged grids of the
diptych and triptych formats. This sets up a dialog between the intuitive side of
painting and the analytical presence of real space. The device of networks of
interchangeable horizon lines has given way in my landscape series to an abstracted,
atmospheric space. The landscape imagery moves through and exists in a variety of
spatial environments created in multiple canvases. My goal is always to create a
single work that has many different levels of accessibility.
