Artist Statement
Impending Presence, a cycle of paintings, explores the mystery of form and consciousness emerging from the chaos of formlessness. In these abstract works, fields of rich color shift and coalesce, playing out before the viewer's eyes the drama of creation itself.
Impending Presence has three distinct phases. In the beginning is a state of barely undifferentiated matter, a claustrophobic, organic world, embodied in a group of earth-toned canvases. In the second phase, a charged dialogue starts with the separation of the space into diffused zones of saturated color. Here powerful forces contend, bringing a world into being. In the final phase, a release from this creative struggle, the viewer enters an ethereal realm of sky or water.
The paintings develop in an intensive, layered process. Modeling paste, bladed onto gessoed canvas, forms a textured topographical surface that becomes the composition's foundation. Metallic oil paint is then applied, followed by washes of color, that are successively sanded and reapplied. The result of these many stages is a complex atmosphere of luminous color. The metallic paint creates an iridescent ground that changes its appearance depending upon one's vantage point.
Impending Presence is a series that seeks to draw the viewer in, to experience the paintings both as microcosms, on the level of subtle textures and tiny metallic particles, and as macrocosms, complete pictorial visions. With this work, the viewer is invited on a journey that is at once human and spiritual. We begin in the primordial depths, where there is no mind, only physicality and energy. We travel through an inner landscape of constant cosmic and personal transformation. And in the end, we arrive at a place of clarity, the vivid tranquillity of consciousness. |
