Intentions

Black Lab

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How It Used To Be, How It Is Now

After I returned from my research trip to London, I made a short animation about one particular experience I had when I was there. In recalling the stories of my childhood, when my mother would tell me about her home and neighborhood that she grew up in (Abbeywood, London), I was interested in visiting her childhood home. This was a home that my mother's family lived in shortly after WWII up until they died in the 1970's. The garden of my mother's memories was a special place. Since the house has not been in our family since the late Seventies and my mother preferred to remember the house as she knew it, if I wanted to visit, it would be without her. I contacted the current owners and they invited me to tour the house with my sister (who acted as my guide since she remembered it as a child). It was a strange visit. I had never been to this house, but I had envisioned it many times. My older sister had many more memories as she had often gone to visit as a child. When we arrived, it was evident that there were numerous changes. Time had not been kind. There was hardly anything left that was reminiscent of my mother's time. I looked out the window of my mum's former bedroom; what once was a beautiful garden, now was a pile of dirt. Later, I had my mother make a memory drawing of the garden of her childhood. Taking some old  photos, my mum's drawing, and my recent photograph, I made this collage.

Spring 2010

The semester is off to a good and challenging start. I have some very thought provoking classes and am really having to push the limits of my critical thinking. I have been working on a new painting the last couple of weeks. The way I am painting it has caused me to return to my Basement painting and reassess how and why I painted it the way I did.

This "in progress" painting (see below) is the second in this reverse narrative that I am attempting to work through. This painting is about leading the viewer through the house, and while we're still in the shadowy entity of the basement, it is my intention to move on up to various parts of the house (psyche), the abandoned and decay will shift to a more inhabited space, and color will start to become more apparent. I've been reading Gaston Baschelard's "Poetic Space" and have started to think about the space of a house and its rich symbology.

I've been pondering ideas behind residue, what's left behind, what's underneath, what's behind, and whats invisible, yet can be felt.

Fall Semester Over!!

Woo hoo! Made it through my first semester and I didn't do so bad! Received Honors Pass on my paper, comparing my practice to the work of Gerhard Richter, while discussing the theories of Roland Barthes' and his essay "Death of the Author"....whew!
Then I had my final critique with my crit group, advisor, and 2 visiting artists. I think it went over very well. I have some things to think about and work on, but I think Im going to rock the 2nd semester----with some work ;)

Here are the 5 paintings that I did in 6 weeks. The last one is probably more of the direction I will be going in. I am interested in creating a collection of "things", including paintings, that will explore a reverse or non-linear narrative that's about shifts in temporal space, memory, and historicity.

The works are large. The last gray scale painting is 6' x 9'. The others are a bit smaller (4'x5' and 4'x4')