Creative Process
I apply the colors and textures based on how they make me feel emotionally and physically. It's the interaction of the tints, tones and shades along with the painting process itself that keeps me coming into the studio every day.
I gradually add texture, colour, and shapes, switching between tables, the wall, and the floor. Over several weeks, I gradually build up multiple layers of acrylic paint and various mixed media. Gradually an alchemy take place as the painting begins to emit tactile energy.
Painting is an exhilarating physical experience.
Painting authentically necessitates that I trust my intuition and refrain from overthinking. It's always a balance of conscious and unconscious, of controlling and letting go of the paint. Everything changes when I add or remove something from the canvas. I’m forced to react.
This back-and-forth 'conversation' with the painting gives me a rush of energy that I hope to translate into the painting.
Artist Statement
My eye has been drawn to the horizon since my childhood experience of long scenic car rides with my parents. During these extended exploratory trips driving through Europe, Canada and the United States, I watched blurred landscapes slide by through squinted eyes from the backseat.
To me, the middle band between the foreground of earth and the distant skyline is always the most exciting. This is where the shapes, textures and bursts of color stand out in highest contrast. It’s where the energy between opposites is at its most electric.
My abstract landscape paintings explore this heightened sense of energy as expressions of color and organic texture. Rather than depicting specific scenes, this series takes an imaginary journey in nature that feels familiar at a subconscious level.
Each painting explores a distinct and unique palette of colors in an organic composition to evoke movement and flow. Multiple layers of acrylic paint, in various consistencies, are built up on the surface of each stretched canvas to mimic the sensuous tactility of encaustic wax.
The combinations of color and physically applied texture create a vibrational interaction that is palpable. The result offers an impression of nature that brings forth lingering memories of a forgotten landscape.
The aim of my art is to create a sensory experience that emits vibrational energy from its surface and creates an irresistible urge to touch. I want the viewer to feel the essence of the landscape, and immerse themselves in the colorful world that I've created.
Normally, I work on 3-6 large canvases at the same time. Layers are built up in variations of one palette over the course of a few weeks.
I occasionally let the paint flow naturally into organic forms.
All of my paintings express a sensation of energetic forces generated by tactile texture and color.