Excerpts from:

​Ask Me About My Art  / 2020

 

"In my work I always strive to keep an essence of what I am most passionate about, and that is the exploration of our relationship to nature, animals and the things that surround us.  

Humans have disconnected ourselves from nature and I have dedicated a lifetime to exploring the reconnection through art."

​
Where does your inspiration come from? 

      "Everywhere! That's a bit of a tough question because inspiration is fluid and constantly evolving and it changes minute to minute, hour by hour.  I could be passionate about circles one day and trip over a rock and obsess about the color of that particular rock for a decade.  It's a constant surprise for me, that's what makes life, and art... interesting and beautiful. I think as an artist, one must become disciplined to focus the inspiration and funnel it into things that also contain passion, for me, I'm passionate about nature, land and the community that surrounds me...but also ethics, psychology and human relationships and also humor... and so much of my successful work comes from those places."

What is your creative process?

       "Well, that might be an entire separate book! I guess the simple answer is that I dump the creative things that clutter my brain into art so I can make room to upload all the new things....haha...but seriously, a creative process can be agonizing at times, it's a "thing" for me to start challenging how I have successfully painted in the past, and literally, forget how to paint...so my creative process goes flying and then I have to re-enter reality and remember how to execute the idea with the skill I have stored somewhere in my brain hard drive, sometimes, I just forget the name of the folder I put it in and end up sending out a search party." 

What medium do you primarily work in?

      "Depends on the subject, the colors I am drawn to that day, the subject I'm looking at and whatever it is that is inspiring me at that moment...I use whatever tool necessary to best convey the story, image, or message.  I do seem to have a comfort level with acrylic on canvas, written word or digital photography, I frequently lean on and return to those tools after trying a few other things.  Frequently, I use multiple tools, like I may start with a sketch, then put the idea into a linocut, then scan it and color it in a digital format to get an idea of how the colors interact, then eventually it makes its way to canvas.  Sometimes, a simple photograph gets the job done and there's no further need to explore it."