Artist Statement (For the time being)

           My current work is the culmination of ideas I began working with about 5 years ago. I was looking for a way to incorporate many of the things I love about art making. I began working in various modes: realism, abstraction, observation, imagination. My goal is to take all the things I love and let them meld together in one pot. The only way to truly express the way I currently feel about life is to allow these things to coexist. For me, they belong together.

          This idea sometimes translates as a shift in control, from intentional to unintentional, by way of disruption and perpetual re-imagination of composition as the piece moves forward. This guided spontaneity allows for the work to unfold in ways that make it exciting for me. I need to be surprised. If I know exactly what the painting is going to look like in the end, then it stops being interesting. I lose the drive to finish it.

           My work is informed by the world around me. I’m making work that I want to see and letting the things I enjoy participate in the experience. I’m letting inspiration happen when it happens. I’m letting imagery from film and television creep into the work because I enjoy these things and believe that some of it has merit. Animals are constantly showing up to perform various functions. Humans have become more abstracted and more absent. I’m allowing myself some breathing room. Everything feels fragmented, so that’s how the work is turning out. I’m not the first person to do this and as this aesthetic gains traction, I will surely not be the last. This is just how I feel right now. Here. On this planet. In this universe. Now