Artist Statement

I am an assemblage sculptor.  I am a maker of sight poems.  My gathered objects, lexicons of symbolic imagery, inform my work on a visceral level.

Words are also a source of inspiration for me. I use objects in combination with the written word. This allows me to layer information throughout every aspect of my work. The resulting artwork is a type of sight poem. The surreal juxtapositions that occur from this layering inform the work on an intuitive level. As a rule, I create my art in a series. When exhibiting a series of work, I believe another layer of meaning is created.

The underlying meaning of my work is redemption. I use reclaimed materials and redeem them. There is powerful symbolism in the thought that a piece of refuse can be transformed, given new meaning and elevated to a gallery wall–especially true when the work relates to human conditions. This idea runs through every assemblage and installation that I create.

I feel my work is most successful when the assemblages as “carriers of the idea complex” speak on a spiritual level, that contemplative arena where ultimately words fail.