Statement
I have succumbed to the narrative trend in my visual art ... thematic work in series has become “book”. Athough it was not my original intention to create images for use in a book, an invitation to participate in an exhibition (Turning Pages, a book show running concurrent with last year’s Miami Book Fair International) spurred that new facet of my work. To me, it seems that the progression of my woodcut images from isolated images, to works in a series, to a story may have been inevitable. It is important to me that an image can tell a story. The woodcut has been a traditional illustration medium for hundreds of years and it has been my primary medium (after drawing) for ten years. The ideas that drive these works are based in storytelling. Each image however remains a discrete capsule both visually and conceptually. The book format allows me to elaborate on the connections between people and places, weaving narratives around and through the pictures.
I look at an image as having layers of experience attached, open to interpretation and extrapolation. My stories come out of my personal experience, but they are also informed by others’ experiences. My audience is generous with their own contributions, staking claims on people and places they know, and adding their own part to my story. The themes in my work run from metaphors taken from my immediate physical environment to common shared experience. The images really never stand alone, but draw their power from various factors that inform our perception.
The “escape” books are in one sense a travelogue... a report of a journey complete with pictures to enhance and clarify the story. But the more potent aspect of these images is the way they depict specifically one person’s point of view fixed in time and space. The woodcut images grouped become more than the sum of their parts; they describe my distinct vantage point, metaphorically as well as literally. They are a slice of my life. I do not claim any special insights, but depend on shared human experience. The part of the exchange that most interests me is the shared experience that makes these pictures hang on in one’s memories.
I have also tried to infuse objects, landscapes and people with the richness that life brings to the table at any given time. Just as Aesop wrote his fables based on the actions of animals and their behavior, I try and use mundane household objects to illustrate the ongoing interaction between myself and other people. The drama that unfolds daily on a small scale is what builds the changes in my life and in the world around me. This is what I would commit to paper, wood, canvas, or film.