Weaverville, NC
Inspired by my blind father, my 3-D paintings aim to bring nature to life. Capturing the vibrant energy and intrinsic beauty of our natural surroundings, these highly textured acrylics and oils are designed to lift one's spirits and suggest childlike wonder. In order to achieve the desired mood for my work, I combine an expressionistic flair for painting with a sculptor-like technique by applying thick multiple layers. The resulting style achieves a richness of depth that explodes with color, flows with light, and evokes an emotional response as with this treetop series. For example in “Full Circle,” I started thinking about how everything has its life cycle. Trees evolve from season to season, sprouting buds, forming leaves, turning in the fall and eventually dying back in the winter. Time is a constant. In our lives, the idea of time is often in the back or our mind. How long will we be here and how are we going to spend it? So, here I used nature as a metaphor. I arranged the seasons in the pattern of a clock face, representing the cycle of life. Twelve main trunks act like the hours in a day, arranged in a circle as time ticks on. Gazing into the treetops like looking up to the heavens, light shines through as a reassuring beacon of hope and what’s beyond.
