My Artist's Statement

Finally I have found the words.  Here is my artist's statement.  

Artist Statement

I paint because I am in love with the creative process.   The final product may indeed teach me something about myself, about how I view the world, or about what I care deeply about, and as such each painting stands as a statement intended for me, and, I hope, one that will resonate with others.  But the great satisfaction, the great fascination for me, is the “getting there,” going from a blank canvas to the finished product.  Although I am always present in the doing, I am still surprised by the way a painting ends.  

I especially like the experience of starting with just a few things—three tubes of paint and a thought or some music for inspiration—and seeing what can come of it.  I put paint down and lift it off, I scrape, I carve text into it, I spray it with water and rubbing alcohol, add more paint, I make marks with my fingers, with paper towels and with just about anything interesting I can get my hands on.  In other words, I get into the painting.  This is my “start” and from the chaos that results I “find” the painting by adding layers and by lifting layers, by adding lines and by subtracting lines.  It is this repetitive, intuitive, give-and-take process that thrills me, in part because it is so much fun and in part because ultimately it results in a painting.   I know that a work is done when I realize that if I add or subtract one more thing it will be the start of a new painting.  That’s when I sign it.

Various themes and imagery tend to run throughout my work: the theatre, dance, spirituality, and family.  My 12 years of parochial school education, my background in dance, my studies of the theatre and my career as a theatre teacher, my practice of Cosmos Qigong, and my deep love for my family all inform that imagery.  I paint to explore and to celebrate these things that matter to me.  It is my hope that I paint them in a way that reminds the viewers of something that matters deeply to them.