Statement

isual art is about the experience of

making

and the experience of viewing

- about non duality

When I was 5 or 6 I saw a neighbour draw a picture of a lion’s head and since

then I’ve been hooked. Mark making

–

line,

shape

and colour coming together

to form an image is an experience that never loses fascination. Life often

gets

in the way

but I always

go back to making images. I grew up in rural Ontario,

spending time between farm

country and

cottage country.

Urban

experiences

came later so I feel most comfortable with landscape and the

human form. The

second half of my life has

been in

British Columbia around mountains and

ocean. My

landscapes images are also

more or less evenly split between

Ontario and

British Columbia.

For the most part I make paintings in oil on board, canvas or linen, sometimes

using acrylic to speed the process

when

doing

the

underpainting, but always

working over in oil. I like the finish in oil, and the ability work the surface

longer. I

also like to

be able to

layer the paint on a surface to build richer

colour and to glaze. Even when working

with water

colour I prefer

gouache to

transparent colours because of the ability to layer colour without making the

painting muddy.

And yes, I’m way

too hard on

brushes.

Over the years I have explored colour, form, geometry and abstraction, which

has added structure to the

compositions

and

cohesion to the colour in my

current paintings. For a time I used a calculator when working our

compositions, but

am no

longer so

exacting. I like images that let me feel a

connection to places I know and to the

natural environment.

There is

often a

discordant

note like logs washed up on a beach, or fields cut into what was

once forest, but there is

also potential for

renewal.

I'm

hoping that in the making and the viewing of images like these we

take time to reflect on the fragility of the

landscape

Favourite Book: Bill Bryson - A Short History of Nearly Everything