Artist Statement

Ethos
My mother was an artist. She was a single mother that worked as a secretary to support my brothers and myself. However, she had a basement studio and was always busy with a project. She painted, quilted, sculpted and wrote poetry. I was taught very early that the creative process, being creative and making things, was valuable and important. This creative seed lives within all of us and it is our responsibility to realize and promote it.

I’m one of those people that likes to have variety in my tasks and interests. However, I then must set aside time to be alone and process the information through my filter. I journal and draw almost everyday. These musing than become the basis of the art that I present publically.
Most of my work is autobiographical and is a reflection of what is happening in my life or those close to me. However, I also want to tell a story that has a universal appeal. I often use archetypes from religion or myths to relate the story to others. I also usually work in a serial fashion, exploring an idea or subject through multiple images.

My career began with using traditional mediums such as printmaking and painting but moved to digital image making when I discovered how the medium leant itself to my style of layering images and using transparencies. Many of my images contain thirty or forty layers of textures, symbols, and images. Its also allows me to recycle pieces of images. For instance, the tree in one image may become a texture in another, thus keeping a consistency of form across the multiple images in a particular series.

Twin Homes
Twin Homes is a collection of seventy-seven images arranged in a distinct order and viewed as one piece. The images retain their individuality but lines created by light, shadows, and the objects themselves lead the viewer’s eye around the piece and connect the images.

In the past two years I have moved several times. Each time, I attempted to make the new area my home. I needed to develop a sense of the familiar and a sense of belonging. So I walked. I trudged the paths and sidewalks of the new neighborhoods taking photographs of what was presented in front of me and under my feet. In addition to getting to know the people, the dogs they walked, and the history of each place, I discovered a beauty in the shapes and colors of the objects that surrounded me.

This piece is a portrait of the two places that I currently call home, Villa Park, Illinois and Fort Wayne, Indiana. The photographs are identifiable to viewers familiar with those places, like Freiman Square or the York Theater. However, hopefully they are also universal and could be a part of almost any urban environment. The colors, shapes, and text were used to add a sense of the whimsical and humor.

Influences
Recently, David Carson and Milton Glaser have had a great influence on my work. Carson often uses a combination of text and abstracted imagery to create a mood. In his work, it is not obvious how people should read or view the work. It is open to interpretation and the viewer must decipher his message, much like solving a puzzle. I continue to also study the graphic work produced by Push Pin Studio and Milton Glaser for its use of humor, shape, and color.

Technically, the photography in Twin Homes is greatly influenced by the work of Edward Weston. I greatly admired his sense of composition and the crispness of his textures.