I draw the human figure with potential. I think of figures as having the ability to manipulate the objects that surround them. In my drawings the figures are seen accumulating items, preserving information, and even building towers. I am one of them. I draw my own potential. I draw my own impotence.

Whether a task is considered to be intellectually elevated or mundane we face the vanity of our pursuit. I am inspired by the fact that by carrying on the seemingly mundane tasks of life, always facing our own inadequacy, we connect ourselves with what is meaningful and important. I am inspired by films such as Everything is Illuminated and It’s a Wonderful Life. The quality of the Bible book of Ecclesiastes is the setting for my motivation.

I am interested in conveying experiences through drawing and painting. I believe that a good drawing needs intuitive rightness. Materials including alla prima oil paint and thick sticks of charcoal help me to search out this intuitive rightness boldly. I often plan an ordered composition, later taking it through a complete overhaul, without fear of painting-out or erasing something that I may have spent hours developing. Often, traces of the original draftsmanship remain as a part of my narrative of human pursuit and its seeming waste at times.

Although a drawing or painting is a dead object, it can sometimes be a living thing. Rembrandt’s gesture, Kathé Kollowitz’ expression of feeling, Van Gogh’s use of color where it has no logical place, all leave me in pursuit of what is human in drawing. Currently, I am looking to contemporaries such as Giocometti, Xenia Hausner, and David Bailin for this reason.

The space in my drawings and paintings may often seem slightly awkward or fractured. This positively comes from my intuitive approach to compositions, but also references both the idealness and inherent inadequacy of drawing and painting to depict differences in time, place, and experience.