My painting process is intuitive and improvisational. Whether working on canvas or paper, water is the fluid carrier of the images that emerge. Paintings start with drops that bleed into a set of eyes, the shape of a face or perhaps the posturing of a shoulder. Paint drips down the surface of a canvas to pour and pool into forms that reveal what they want to become. The process of painting becomes an act of searching, waiting for something or someone to emerge. In the liminal space of waiting there is a relationship between influencing the form and surrendering to the medium itself. Inside this in-between presence surprises emerge and characters from unseen places make themselves known.
One of my artistic intentions is to create opportunities for audiences to explore complex emotions, using fantasy as a visual language to imagine new worlds. How might these whimsical and unusual characters ask us to pause and consider our emotional reactions, memories, and stories? How might surreal environments get us to relate to and reflect on our own internal and external landscapes? In the mock-up pictured here, characters, or “selves'' gaze curiously at each other and at an audience who greets them. Some appear like spirits or soul bodies peeking through lush foliage, or giants gently watching over their neighbours. In paused moments of watchful looking, the public can find a unique connection that speaks to their inner experience. For a moment, we are suspended together inside an ethereal world, where characters guide our encounters with self, others, and magical realms.