My images reflect and explore memory through landscape. My investigation not only concerns nostalgia for my home but also explores my understanding of time – what time has hidden from me, and what it has yet to reveal. Living in New England my whole life, the land reflects my own history, and evokes a subconscious memory of itself – revealing the stories of its past. The elements of my home (the land, the rivers, the trees and stone) resonate with a spirit that I have come to recognize over the past twenty-one years. As I recognize the physical and spiritual presence of my environment, I work to find a better understanding of myself as a living part of the landscape.
I reveal forms and images as they present themselves in my heart and my mind. The union of the “natural” and man-made is a dominant aspect of my work. Old fences, stonewalls, ladders and buildings become landmarks of the land and evoke the spirit and memory of people who were here before me. I consider their existence as I wonder what I might encounter as I proceed with my journey in this environment.
Where my drawings often reveal a literal landscape, color explores the spirit and emotion of a place. The abstraction of image allows me to see a feeling, and touch a sense of what actually exists in the forms I see. It is in the manipulation of an image that I find true form exists, and in that recognition, for a brief moment, I find a universal truth that connects me to the land and people of my home.
Through painting, color allows me to define the essence of a memory or a moment. Ambiguous forms are created through splashes and cascades of color; the image is brought to life, reflecting the spirit, rhythm and energy of a place. My mark making through line creates an immediate impression of myself in the work. My marks are driven through impulse, and often become rhythmic elements of the work. Together, color, line, memory and rhythm define my work just as my works define me.
