I am fascinated by the mind – by its power, logic and irrationality, its ability to be a million places at once, to focus on a single idea or to disappear altogether. I am also interested in order – specifically internal systems of order set up by the mind to manage anxiety, find meaning, understand life and create a sense of security.

My work occupies the intersection among order, coincidence and manipulation, and gets at a quiet understanding of exploration.

The paintings explore the results of following systematic impulses. These impulses are the paintings’ organizing principles.  I use a facet of my own life – an anecdote or idiosyncratic thought-process – to set up a structure. This structure functions as a means of control.  This leads to a purposeful detachment in the paintings – a denied anxiousness that results in a peaceful resolve.

The specifics of each system become irrelevant and the paintings move into a visual construction of compulsions, a sensual experience of form, movement, order and color. Coincidence and contingency come into play and perceptual shifts occur as order and intuition converge.  Casual marks gain significance in the compositions and interact with the other marks, becoming anything but casual or incidental.   There is a reduction in the physical tactility of the surface that lends to the abstraction – an unthere thereness.

The paintings mimic the contingent nature of life. They are more anecdotal than heroic, more off-kilter than grand.  My work hypothesizes that all events have equal opportunity to be important.  At times the small, seemingly unimportant events become the most impactful moments and the major events become mere bumps in the road.  There is a generosity and unfamiliarity in the work that reward continued viewing.

The systematic approach allows me to get out of the way by letting the compulsions carry on and become structural foundations that lead to open-ended compositions.