Artist Statement
Great Perfect Mirror, 2010, 4" x 6", oil on linen mounted on panel
Recent Thoughts
The cycle of climate paintings I am currently working on, based on water, fire, earth, and air, is the culmination of my series about migration. "Who am I?” has become “What is my moment?” The historical moment we all share is extraordinary. The climate crisis threatens all life on earth, while solving it presents the possibility of global transformation to a just and equitable world. The stakes have never been higher: the dangers have never been greater, and the possibilities have never been more magnificent.
The arc of my family resides within the greater arc of time. WWII shaped my grandparents, the seeming bubble of security after the war shaped my parents, and my life has been, and continues to be, shaped by the double threat of nuclear destruction and climate crisis. This moment also offers the possibility of remaking the world in a way that sustains every life.
My language of a seamless world of people, animals, and place is the language of this interconnection. Like the environment, every painting is a web of nesting, interlocking relationships, a unity in which nothing can be added or removed without everything being different. Climate crisis is the ultimate illustration of the powerful truth that we are all in it together--- not just humanity, but every living thing on earth.
Our culture’s denial of our interconnectedness with all life has caused the destruction of our planet. But realizing and acting on this truth will let us save it. My job as a painter is to create paintings that speak about this existential dilemma in personal language that people can hear. My job as an art worker is to work use these paintings to inspire people to action. It's to connect people to themselves and each other, so that each person can find their place in the mass movement that will be necessary to create a sustainable future. In this way, it is my hope and intention that my paintings will become part of the great web of healing I firmly believe can save our planet.
Long View
The world is unknowable. Yet as I get older, I keep returning to two essential truths. One is impermanence: everything is always changing. The other is unity: every single thing is always related to every single other thing.
Painting is one of the ways I wear down my own resistance to these truths. Working from observation and invention, I am a transient creature honoring the totality of each passing moment of my life within the life of the world.
Like every place in the world, every painting is a web of nesting, interlocking relationships. It is a unity in which nothing can be added or removed without everything being different. The seamlessness of each painting celebrates another unique and irreplaceable now: being this, seeing this, knowing this, inventing this, at this time.
Magical realism’s sleight of hand is ideally suited to this task. Realism’s first magic trick, turning a two-dimensional jigsaw puzzle of light shapes and shadow shapes into three-dimensional forms, creates the second trick of magical relaism, transforming those forms into metaphor and meaning. This double trick makes painting the perfect language for creating a reality that is deeper than copying the skin of an appearance. As Picasso put it, “Art is a lie that makes us realize truth, at least the truth that is given us to understand.”
Part of the truth I have been given to understand is that the world is always different than what I thought. One growing and stunning realization is that what had appeared to be security to my younger self is actually leading to planetary destruction. Yet the eternal truths remain true: impermanence and unity we will always have with us. Painting I will always have with me, but now that I have realized the the world is different, I am a different painter. Now I realize that, in the words of Bertolt Brecht, it is “not a mirror held up to reality but a hammer with which to shape it.” I am swinging this hammer with all of my heart, all of my soul, and all of my might.