Abstract Paintings

Archangel Thunderbird- 2024- Oill on panel 8”x10”

Untitled 8”x10” 2024

My creative practice is highly process oriented. By that I mean that I find inspiration from identifying and manipulating the materials that the artwork becomes constructed out of. These materials include elements of nature, chance, and chaos. My concepts often involve identifying and working with elements that have an extra symbolic quality to them. The process becomes about the transformation of these often non-traditional “painting” elements into a pictorial painted image. 

These abstract paintings were all painted using discarded old and decaying, common latex house paint. Working with old house paint is a direct reference to my fathers scientific work. He worked for the Food and Drug Administration and he developed a quick and easy chemical process to determine the presence of dangerous levels of lead in paint and other products. He patented his discovery in 1991 Pat. number 5010020. Today, his lead detection kits are commonly available in hardware stores and used afor detecting dangerous lead paint in people's homes. The test kits are simple and low cost enough for anyone to use and self test for the presence of dangerous levels of lead.

These paintings were created by applying many layers of paint that directly references layers of paint that exist on walls in older Brooklyn apartments and homes. The color pallets are limited because I only had a small collection of expired house paint to work from. Paint was gradually built up layer after layer. The paint being nearly scraped off in between each application layer.This effect “self” creates delicate forms of color that blend together and dissolve in an unpredictable way. Through the cycles of painting and scraping the paintings virtually build themselves. Eventually they arrive at a point where they become “alive” and come into being as a realized finished painting.