Motivation

When I first moved to North Carolina in 2004, life changed for me and I started painting, again.  I had not created artwork -despite having a degree in Fine Art- in my spare time since I lived in Charleston, SC in 2001.   Making art always coincides with the happiest and healthiest times in my life.  I just can't seem to have one without the other.  So when inspiration came, I jumped in and start creating art in earnest because I was excited about ideas and wanted to work through them.

This one was inspired by a fight scene in a bamboo forest in a movie, House of Flying Daggers.  24" x 48" 2005

This one was inspired by quilts.  48" x 48" 2006

Momentum slowed as I started graduate school to study architecture.  Although I was still creating and designing, the pressure, schedule, constant competition and mountain of knowledge to be climbed proved to be more demanding than I ever imagined.  Except for a couple of projects that I had begun before school, I quit painting.

3 1/2 years later, when my final semester rolled around, I began to relax and imagine life outside of school.  You know sunshine, sleep, talking to people who weren't obsessed with architecture. And the urge to paint came back.  I would day dream about using the bucket of gesso I had bought during my third semester after being inspired by the work of Richard Meier to give my architectural models a soft chalky white finish.  I wanted to make a soft chalky paintings full of texture and movement

Not long after graduation I made a little room in my budget to buy stretcher strips and canvas and started to work.  It developed as I painted.  I used a pallet knife to move the gesso around.  I experimented with applying the ink only to work it back in to space of the canvas, eventually I built up a ridge of gesso down the center of the canvas.  While the gesso was still wet I dripped ink down the ridge.  As it ran down the canvas, it found its own path around the bumpy gesso mound and soaked into the gesso.

Finished piece 32" x 32" 2010

Detail

We hung it in our dining room.  You know...like people do...

One day a dear friend who works at the Nasher Museum, asked if she could buy it.  Having someone who really understands art want to have my work is one of the best feelings ever. Talk about motivation!  It really reminded me why I love painting, drawing, designing, building and creating in general.  There's a thrill in developing and interacting with something as it takes on a life of it's own.  New ideas arise through your process and then become another idea.  It's the continuum that I love.  I visited her recently for a house concert by an incredible music duo from NYC and snapped a quick photo: 

My painting is hanging by a metal fish sculpture - a beautiful piece by another local artist.