Much of my work includes undertones of the tenuous relationship between art & faith. I am always asking the question of how religious meaning & the role of the artist can intersect & be mutually illuminative, or conversely need not anything to do with the other. Rather than the belief that the faith-full artist must tidy up reality, I wonder how can the artist be true to what one sees & believes, to the presence of the relative & the possibility of the absolute? My hope is that faith does not have to compromise artistic caliber, & one can still be loyal to their work without losing their faith. I believe to create within this space is actually our responsibility as artists, both to the form of the work, to faith, & to audiences.
36" x 24"
acrylic, aged photos, tissue paper, pastel 2014
Time seems to become nothing less than the vehicle of God's providential action. This is of a piece with far more time-laden vision of the incarnation, one which is able to embrace the entire story of all birth and deaths, in which the world's time is not negated or set aside but healed.
Jeremy Begbie, "Keeping in Time" in Quartets
5" x 5"
aged photo, tissue paper, acrylic, colored pencil 2014
The artist cannot hold back; it is impossible because art involves participation in suffering, ills, and occasional stabbing joys that come from being part of the human drama ... We have to be braver than we think we can be, because God is constantly calling us to be more than we are, to see through the plastic sham to the living, breathing reality, and to break down our defenses of self-protection in order to be free to receive and give love.
Madeleine L'Engle, Walking on Water
18" x 27"
pen & acrylic 2013
"What are your narratives around safety and certainty, or lack thereof? I hear you talking about it but not naming it specifically. Your desire to move on to something else in a hard conversation shows up in your writing. There are several instances where you end a paragraph with an important realization, only to switch topics in the next. What do you know about this tendency of yours? How well can you actually suffer?"
15" x 25"
pen and ink, watercolor 2016
Beauty cannot be encountered in its fullness apart from acknowledgement of suffering, contingency, and need ... Beauty's very woundedness is the occasion for redemption.
Bruce Herman, "Wounds and Beauty" in The Beauty of God
24” x 36”
charcoal, acrylic & paint pens 2019