MONUMENT
| Instead of presenting a traditional landscape in which the viewer is distanced from the cliff, I choose to reduce that gap. The viewer is brought close to the intimate interior of the rock, becoming a part of its physical enviroment. This proximity abstracts the stone and reveals crevices and curves which might otherwise be overlooked. My intention is to illuminate the innate beauty and intense life that these structures contain. Themes such as erosion/regeneration and destruction/rebirth are constant in all my work. The processes that created these patterns mirror the psychological and physical transformations we go through constantly in our lives. We build up and we break down. What doesn’t kill us makes us stronger. What better metaphor than the metamorphoses of rock? It shifts, falls, accumulates, and sediments. It is a combination of many different materials that over time blend together to create something new and strong. It is an amazing thing all on its own, but when you think about how we grow, the paths we take, the pain we experience, the complexity of our minds constantly changing, it is an even more compelling metaphor. As a people, we are also going through these kinds of processes. We are a young country experiencing a great deal of change, especially now. We are being constantly reminded how fragile and vulnerable we are when we take what we have for granted. Simultaneously we are realizing our strength and unity in the face of crisis. The name of this series of paintings is “Monument.” The subjects are the rocky cliffs of the California coast and the canyons of Utah. |
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