Artist Statement - The Mystical Within Abstraction

I work with the mystical within the language of abstraction, through painting.

Surface, space and a feeling of an otherworldly environment creates a place that the viewer enters and experiences elements of beauty, conflict, power and violence.  The intensity of these elements interacting is what continues to fascinate me and compels me to work. These are the ideas that keep me up at night and in my studio working at all hours.

Being obsessed with color has taken over my work and my paintings, followed very closely with that of internal light. I paint gestural abstractions that reference the figure and play with the planes of space.  The effect of internal light is one that has fascinated me and stems from years of looking at stained glass.  I have traveled to various parts of the world to see a piece of glass that I had been intrigued by.  This includes trips to Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Hungary and too many places in Western Europe to mention.  It has been the vibrancy of color and light that drew me to stained glass.  This specificity of color and light and the desire to control both within the realm of oil paint, led me to make my own paint from dry pigments.  As a result, there is a complete control of pigment saturation, color depth and intensity.

I am ambidextrous, painting with both hands simultaneously.  This creates a varied and specific rhythm to my work.  Through the years I have learned that it is necessary to work on several pieces at the same time.   This allows me to have continuity within a body of work that would otherwise be impossible to achieve. It also gives me space to breathe and think while I am painting.  

While being influenced by the school of abstract expressionism, I have continued to push through that to use the language of abstraction to reference a narrative that lives both within myself and another spiritual realm.  These paintings are the visual representation of when the outside world collides and does battle with the spiritual realm. I am currently working on the concept of the mystical within abstraction.  My own small rituals of my studio practice have evolved over the years.  Things as simple as unlocking my studio door to changing into my painting clothes has become part of my studio practice.  The very specific light that comes into the studio in the morning through an old stained glass window that I have installed into my space prepares me to paint.  For me it is a connection to light, space, spirit and a very strong sense of belonging to this world of painting and creating.  It’s often a conversation between myself and the work, however it is not words that are used as there simply are no words for what I am trying to say with my work.  I am saying it through very formal elements of color, composition, line, and form.  The mystical/spiritual part is what the paintings keep insisting on.  I have learned to listen to them and see where they lead me.  I am often surprised, sometimes shocked and overwhelmed, but very often it’s the simple beauty of color, light, line, and space that captivate my attention.

These paintings/work represent the visual manifestation of these struggles during the years after 9/11, my own sexual assault, and a worldwide pandemic.  Once again having to turn to painting as a place that can most accurately convey how I process the world around me.

Entering the studio has become a ritual that has me enter into another world. One in which color, light, gesture, form, environment and the spiritual world reign.  The painting becomes a conversation with another worldly realm and myself.  It’s a place where beauty and violence converge and also a place for contemplation.  The paintings reference a narrative that I am just beginning to understand taking you on a journey of the visual manifestation of the world that exists within and beyond. I often work with the idea of light as it relates to knowledge and energy attempting to tie them together within the painting.  The paintings act as both a key and window into the realm of the spiritual and mystical.

Breathe, focus, meditate and enter into the internal world of my paintings.