ARTIST STATEMENT

Human nature is one and the same with the nature of all living things, plant and animal life, the planet itself. In our time, we have forgotten or lost sight of that connection, allowing mechanistic thinking to dominate our world, while vitalism or the idea of a living world has been relegated to the realm of myth and superstition.
Centuries ago, humanism attempted to reduce man‚s connection to the earth and other living things, while placing scientific man on a pedestal.

In my “fantascapes,” I deconstruct art historical images, by placing the figures in a plant -like environment, as metaphor for a past now reconfigured to emphasize our need for reconnecting to timeless nature. Biomorphic forms that intertwine aspects of sky, sea, and land with the human figure express for me that much-needed symbiotic relationship between man and the natural world----a relationship that has become more and more stressed in our time.

My “symbioti,” figures cut or torn from an historical context, take on a new life in my fantascape paintings and works on paper. Seemingly unrelated objects, sometimes painted, sometimes collaged, are juxtaposed to abstracted shapes, creating a kind of tableau or dramatization of the changeable and interactive aspects of nature.

My process is then a kind of stream-of-consciousness wherein a scene is played out as pieces of paper and painted shapes are conjoined in a narrative that develops compositionally in an almost unconscious way with all the elements coming together on the paper, panel, or canvas backdrop, like pieces in a puzzle.