Conversations and Speeches

The hardest part is getting started. Once a few lines are down, it's easy to become discouraged with the amount of work ahead. I realize the speech I've imagined is full of flaws - most of the idea is not entirely realistic for my experience and skill level. My solution to this discouragement is to abandon the ideal and work with what is in front of me. The drawing, painting or sculpture becomes a conversation; a delicate dance between planning and responding. The big picture is a spontaneous offshoot that is grown with a couple of lines and just enough determination to see it through.

Loss and Learning

I still have a lot to learn about what I'm doing and why. This direction of work began years ago when I was experiencing the loss of loved ones at an alarming rate. Ultimately, I became stoic. My emotions and ideas became focused - neither overly cheerful nor overly somber, but an underlying and steady optimism. In my work, ceremony and nature make appearances in the form of headdresses - ritual, repetition and rhythm - attached to hair and heads as memories to our minds.