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We live in a period in which scientific, quantitative language dominates
much political, social and- at times- cultural dialogue. To my mind, it is
essential for artists to pursue poetic expression both for its own sake, and
as a way to engage social and political issues alongside other
disciplines. This engagement can be very direct, or it can be much more
tangential, effecting individuals by encouraging self-reflection.  With this
broad belief structure as a starting point, therefore, the central issue
within my studio practice is the development of a poetic visual language.

Over the last 5 years I have developed a working methodology that has
brought together several elements for image construction including: 1)
drawings of industrial objects found in the rural environments of Central
Illinois and Alberta; 2) research into a wide variety of historic landscape
works including: Japanese Ukiyo-e prints, Korean ink painting, and
European painting by artists such as Bruegel, and Lorenzetti; and 3)
research into various literary source as a motivational tool.

There is a long history of illustration in print and graphic media
associated with literature, and although I find this work to be an influence,
it is not my intent to work in this same manner. Rather, I am using
literature- most often poetry- as a tool that helps frame my studio practice
providing a context when I am constructing abstract images. To my mind,
it is not essential that a viewer necessarily "read" my works in direct
relation to any one piece of literature. It is my hope, however, that
something of the spirit of various poetic passages might be conveyed,
and that a narrative is implied, but one that is not necessarily linear in
character or easily decipherable to the viewer.

In this regard, I am particularly drawn to literary works that are sensual in
nature and which describe the human body or an environment in
transformation. For example, images such as Dante's description of the
Wood of Suicides in Canto XIII of the Inferno or the transformation of
Daphne in Ovid's Metamorphosis. Images such as these offer readers
many points of entry- literal, allegorical, personal, social and political. By
drawing on these sources as a research tool, it is my intent to bring some
of this complexity of reading to my own work, and create images that
explore terrain between personal, social, historic and contemporary
ideas. In pursuing this end, I create enigmatic objects and environments
that reference both mechanistic and naturalistic forms in order to explore
themes of mutation, metamorphosis and biology/technology dichotomies.