The focus of my work for the most part is abstraction or non-representational painting.  I concentrate on texture, color harmony, design, composition and a layering method to achieve texture. My approach is intuitive, exploratory and experimental.  I find inspiration in nature, dilapidated buildings, rocks and rusty things as well as in my dreams and writings.  For over 20 years I have been working primarily with oils using palette knives in an effort to capture layers and textures that are not achievable with just a brush.

With the palette knife I work wet into wet, layering thicker pigment over thinner pigment. This becomes a journey with unpredictable detours and outcomes which must be resolved along the way. Once I begin, I work spontaneously and intuitively, allowing the painting itself to lead me to the next stroke. For me, painting with some degree of speed is a necessary part of the process of working wet into wet. It allows me to be able to scratch and scrape into the wet surface and allows the layers of pigment to interact in ways that can’t happen once a painting is dry. I like the final results to show the energy and emotion that are a part of the creation of that painting. The residue of accidental happenings can also contribute to keeping my work fresh, exciting, alive and full of unplanned surprises.

Recently, I have begun a new body of work that combines oil paint with cold wax. This is also a layering process but it is different in that there is a slower drying time allowing the surface, not only to  be added to, but subtracted from, and is workable for longer periods of time. I still and will always work with oils and the palette knife for the excitement and energy it brings to my work but I’m enjoying the slower process of exploring and experimenting with oil with cold wax as it allows me to to achieve a greater depth that retains the history of each painting’s journey.

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