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My work is about being somewhere and paying attention.
In a world that is increasingly mediated by technology and language,
the act of consciously taking time to experience an actual, concrete
place in the world would seem almost an act of rebellion. I enjoy, and
have learned to trust the tension that a specific place, a specific
time, a specific set of complex conditions of light and space confer
upon the process of painting. My aim is to capture, not the subject per
se, but the energy of the struggle to see and respond to the
visual complexity of the subject.
I like Susanne Langer's notion that art gives form to feeling. A painting or a drawing, for me, begins only as a sense of possibility, a kind of working hypothesis that undergoes gradual, or at times, dramatic transformation as the painting alters my perception and my perception changes the painting. The process is not unlike sifting and winnowing grain from chaff, finding out gradually what is right and essential to the painting. Knowing what to take out, and when, or being able to sacrifice some attractive passage of paint for the good of the whole is as important as knowing what to put in. In this way, even the false starts, the “repentances” or pentimenti, and the many inevitable adjustments and revisions that a painting undergoes become necessary, meaningful and beautiful, and leave their traces in the final image. |
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