CALLIGRAPHIC MARKS

My attraction to calligraphic marks stems from a combination of early influences such as the vitality and magic of animation and an intrigue with foreign language, characters and communication. There is a common thread between the linear gestures in my work and how communication occurs through a common recognition of symbols. I am motivated to express my life simply and directly like well written comedy, as sharp and pointed as it is open and expansive. Its truth hits the core then resonates. It is light-hearted and dark simultaneously. The lines and marks in my paintings are also inspired by nature, the organic intermingling of all the elements and forms. In my work there is a sense of a particular moment in time connecting with the unknowable. Full concentration and surrender is what I experience in the process of painting. As is said in the Zen tradition, when drinking tea, drink tea. For me painting is exactly about that devotion and entering into the experience completely. That is when creativity occurs. Imposing a particular outcome through control and expectation is avoided in order to keep the process authentic. Being present is to respond to the size and proportion of the surface, the texture, ground, materials, my consciousness and everything that is evoked at that moment. I believe in what was known of Michaelangelo's process that the figures were present in the marble before he began to carve them. There is a reality waiting to be revealed if one is open.