Statement

My early creative passion was photography — a medium through which an artist can snatch pieces of the observable world and transmute the material into something unique and personal. My heroes were people such as Eugene Atget, Walker Evans and  Robert Frank. But as I grew older and went further inward, the appeal of the hand’s markings using non-representational material — i.e., paint — increased. In my collage/paintings, I use photography as one of numerous elements interacting with others: found organic and inorganic materials, newsprint  and words, for example.

What are my concerns? Like  most artists, color is one of the main ones. Two trips to Italy, in 2011 and 2014, exploring art and landscape from Venice to  Rome and on down to the Amalfi coast turned my eyes to  warm, earthy colors.  I also was deeply moved by early Italian painters, chiefly Caravaggio. I admit a romantic attraction to this great revolutionary, who personified the artist as outlaw, but who is chiefly, and justifiably,  remembered for his dramatic use of chiaroscuro — in essence, using darkness to accentuate light — and for making ordinary people, i.e., his friends and lovers, the models for his deeply religious works. 

Other concerns?  Identity, how we perceive ourselves and, indeed, the many “selves” that constitute who we are; and personal, yet deeply universal struggles having to do with  aging, the search for spiritual truths, our embedded memories and the slow and painful letting go of physical reality.