The climate of ill will created by the current administration stirs a never-ending stream of outrage and incredulity. In order to not suffer the pathology within, the three paintings in the project “Primitive Emotions” express the trauma of dealing with the assault of brain stem responses. This project is a link between the Visual Commentary and Behind the Scenes work. Specifically, Snarling Puppy is a bridge expressive of the negativity and raw aggression of this time in history and the wish to document the pathology with an artifact. All three of the paintings are oil on panel and try to make the sickness of coping with the current climate visible in a way that will expose the ugliness so it can be recognized as such when those feelings emerge in the future. Hopefully, the expression of arising affliction in these difficult times will console others that struggle with the anger being generated. Like the stitches in Behind the Scenes, the straps and staples signify the ineffective efforts to contain it. In Frightened Bunny the skin has hardened into shell and the shell itself glorified, making a point of the division. All emphasize the unnatural attachment to the surfaces and not the life force pushing from below.

The new drawings added to Behind the Scenes break down more sophisticated human unkindness. I try to engage the mirror neurons of facial expression without a recognizable face.

There are aspects of understanding that can’t be reached by rational analysis. Too much
breaking down the whole into parts can lead to confusion and the illusion of explanation.
 

Throughout my career, the pastel and colored pencil drawings I use to explore consciousness, reflect on its many levels, and how states of mind are influenced. Exploring the edges  of an emotional state I use clouds to  establish the emotional weather as a boundlessness that we try to pin down. The drawings are philosophical in their intent, questioning the assumption that consciousness is individually localized.

These paintings are oil over collage, a technique that employs the research that went into the subject of the painting, and the hidden influences on our contemporary world. They aim to question misguided values and dangerous trends and have run parallel to my other work for more than thirty years.

During mt 2013 sabbatical I plunged into ideas of material being through work with clay. Painting in oils on stoneware and porcelain I tried to suggest the place where the non- material becomes physical and when the physical begins to shift into spirit.

Connected to visual ideas in the 3D work, this series uses graphite and duralar stitched together with red thread.
The lower layer is watercolor, the stitching drawing attention to key areas. The illusionistic challenge that propelled me was to get the image to seem to push forward as though a force was growing and swelling behind it. The stitching represents resistance to this growth which creates suffering. Formally, in addition to working against the idea of illusionistic space always opening a window out into space, I also create the illusion of the surface pulling against the stitching.