Deep in the northern woods mysterious figures sit around a fire in front of a hunting cabin. They appear and vanish. They are silhouettes or ghostly inhabitants who are consumed by the surrounding landscape. Deer hang eviscerated, a gruesome sacrifice for sustenance and survival. A figure communes with nature, a flight pattern takes place, and foliage mutates revealing colors that are more synthetic than natural. Trees appear to be infected and the ground opens. Nature is conquered and claimed like a trophy hung from a tree, while at the same time it is someplace to retreat to for solace and rejuvenation. Humanity collides with nature; the relationship is out of balance, at odds with itself.
I have always had a strong connection to the land. How I approach and interpret life has been greatly influenced by literature, traditional landscape painting, and contemporary art and issues. I see the physical landscape as a reflection of an individual’s interior landscape and as a manifestation of a society’s history, values, and direction. I am interested in the relationship between people and land: how we navigate through it, engage with it, depend upon it, love and destroy it. It is through the interest in relationships that are simultaneously harmonious, yet full of tension and contradictions that I have arrived at my painting process.
Painting and photography are at odds with one another. I see painting as a warm medium; it invites the viewer to investigate the surface and contemplate how the palette and paint application inform subject and content. My paintings often have painterly moments that are thick and gestural. Sometimes I use a palette knife to apply and scrape away while in other areas the handling can be brushy, or soft and blended. Initially one may think this style does not lend itself to the cool mechanical qualities of the photograph but the camera and photograph become my sketchpad and painting surface. I set out in pursuit of a subject, but instead of sketching a particular vista or scene I use a large format camera to document. I create and manipulate a scene prior to shooting and then alter it further in Photoshop. In my works the painterly passages meet and coexist with the crisp imagery of the photograph and its cut edge. The paint will come onto the photograph, eroding and consuming the line between the two, while in other areas the photograph will rise above the paint. It is in this interplay between the two mediums, in this tension, that my work surfaces.