about my art

Even with a comprehensive art education that included drawing, painting, printmaking, ceramics, and photography, I have always been drawn strongly to sculpture, a medium in which I feel most at home. Perhaps this is because I have always been able to visualize in three dimensions, something I found useful even as a child building plastic models. Now, even before I put pencil to paper to create preparatory sketches, I find 3-dimensional objects taking shape in my mind. The challenge then is to get those ideas onto paper and then realize them as finished sculptures. But throughout the entire process, the original prototype is hovering in my mind's eye.

Another reason for my strong attraction to sculpture is that because of their physical presence, sculptures have a kind of life that paintings and other 2-dimensional art do not. Because they take up space in our lives, space that we must constantly negotiate, it is more difficult to take sculpture for granted. We live with sculpture, not just look at it. And sculpture has a tactile aspect that invites us to explore it with touch as well as sight.

Whether working on a commission or a piece of my own, I never begin without first exploring it thoroughly on paper. This allows me to work out design choices and structural details, thus avoiding unpleasant surprises later. Even so, I'm frequently surprised during the actual crafting of the piece by pleasant discoveries that improve the original concept. Fewer of these discoveries would be possible without that initial planning.

My choice of media is often dictated by the design at hand; each material possessing an inherent set of characteristics and limitations. While it is occasionally fun to challenge those limitations, the most satisfying pieces result from working with the material rather than against it. I find stone particularly gratifying to work with because of its durability, its demand for patience, its link with the earliest roots of our artistic culture, and its immediate connection with the earth.