Artist Statement
My art is about nature: my inner nature and the outer nature of our world, how they come together and express from an experiential standpoint, hopefully reaching a point in which words are useless and unnecessary.
I have incorporated my art making into my path of spiritual transformation. My art is an expression of the unfolding of my heart. I use oils, acrylics, and mixed media to explore and express what is most important to me, namely love, nature, feelings, beauty, personal growth and transformation, and primal energy. I look for images, either inwardly by exploring my sub-conscious mind or outwardly by looking at the world around me, that seem to work as containers of that consciousness. In this way, I think of my art as a kind of poetry—images represent not only something in the “real” world but at the same time also convey a deeper truth about myself and, possibly, the viewer. When I paint, I try to use as many parts of myself as I can in the process such as imagination, intuition, thinking, feeling, passion, and letting go, along with my artistic skills and knowledge of color and composition.
I admire and have been most influenced by a variety of artists, most notably: Julius Hatofsky and Bruce McGaw (two of my teachers at the San Francisco Art Institute where I studied painting), James Weeks, Elmer Bischoff, David Park, John Singer Sargent, George Bellows, Winslow Homer, Gustave Caillebotte, Chaim Soutine, Marc Chagall, Goya and Michelangelo.
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