Statement

Painting is, for me, problem solving. This is true in the sense of my execution solving a specific problem -beginning with a blank canvas and creating a sense of three dimensions on a two dimensional field by employing light and shadow – but it is also true in the sense of creating work whose subject itself seeks to ‘solve’ a problem, or at least explore an idea.

In portraits, I explore the visual aspects of a person and capture a likeness of the image the present to the world. Their mode of dress and the context in which I place them on the canvas all work to convey the message of the portrait, be it of a good leader or a content family.

With landscapes, I seek to show the world, or a piece of it, in a way the viewer has not seen before. To live in the world is to see a landscape everyday, so here my problem to solve is to capture the moment or the aspect of the scene that was special to me, and share that with the viewer.

My still lives explore the idea of our acquisitive nature of myself and what I see in humans in general. The feeling that exists in me when I see or hear about a piece of food that looks so delicious I ‘have’ to try it, or an object that is so shiny and lovely that I want to own it is the feeling I like to explore in my still lives, especially my ‘wrapped up’ series. The image of these things, made special by painting and framing them, is not the real thing and so the real thing is unattainable, but in just painting it I can satisfy that special need to own or taste a thing and make it last even longer.