Artist Statement
As an artist, my work predominately centers on the production of sculpture and site-specific public projects. Inspired by nature and rooted in the art historical tradition of organic abstraction my work draws on the world around me, in particular the observation of nature. My work both abstracts and borrows from the natural world to reveal hybridized forms. My compositions juxtapose commonplace objects including Knick knacks from the flea market and rugs from Target, with handmade sculptural forms. The assembled elements along with the addition of brilliant color and pattern reference the natural world blurring the lines between inside – outside and nature and the artifice. My process of making is closely linked to a way of thinking and seeing and reflecting on the world around. Essentially as a sculptor, an object maker I am continuously in search of form. A process I refer to as finding form - inventing form where it did not previously exist. Principle to my practice are the acts of drawing and modeling. From there I move to refine the forms that then become the anchor of my compositions. I work with a wide range of materials, wood, glass, plaster, ceramic, steel to reveal in each form the essence of materiality and the ability for distinct materials to be emotive communicators. It is both the combinations of materials and their inherent properties that I explore in my work. Seeing potential in unexpected ways, for example perfectly casting a form in plaster then intently letting it erode, to reveal time or perhaps hiding the harshness of a steel cube with a surface layer of soft brilliantly colored flocking. There is a palpable spontaneity inherent in these works-a quirkily liveliness, they are delicate amalgams of many media, thoughtfully constructed and balanced. My sculptures are embedded in the formal language of spatial composition. Color, contrasting material textures and distinctive form are the dominate features in the work. My sculptures straddle the space between representation and abstraction.
