In consideration of human suffering and joy, my current work is a requiem and celebration of humanity. A dichotomy, that I refer to as Love-shit derived from the German slang term I once heard, “liebe scheiße.” My work is a visual ecology of disparate feelings, reflections and responses to our material use, that are ubiquitous and personal. My found-object paintings are docents to our consumer detritus that speak in eloquent, ironic, silly and colorful coded ways. Like a Fool in a play, often mischievous.
These found object paintings use a variety of manufactured goods as content with my interventions, creating a plural commentary on the human world, glut, climate-change, food insecurity, and potential.
Digging through the materials historical content becomes an important step. Looking at and understanding our relationship to them inspires possibilities and narratives in my work. Recently I’ve started using imagery of dogs. They become symbols of witnesses to our human failures and successes.
Much like Japanese Ikebana flower arrangement, I am searching for a visual harmony with the found-object paintings. A balance. The harmony is the celebration element. As is the color use. However, I reimagine the dirty, ordinary and iconic materials into pretty, seductive and gross arrangements that express our human entanglements with materials, hopeful to defamiliarize us from their norm, and introduce new possibilities and meanings, sometimes humorous and other times sardonic.
