Praise

Oil on canvas, 40” x 30” Artist’s Statement: I make art because I find so much joy in the beauty of creation and I want to share that with others. I grew up hiking, running, and horseback riding on the forest trails of Washington State. Making art echoes the experience of following a new trail without knowing where it will lead. A blank canvas is an opportunity for an adventure. Formally, I have chosen simple compositions in order to concentrate on the linear qualities of the pattern that evergreen trees create in the forests I grew up in. I use bright colors in my work in order to distance the work from reality. People have created a reality today consisting of cement and plastic and endless digital screens. These things are unnatural, but unavoidable now. I want my work to give people a few moments of escape from the industrialized world by offering them a look at a simpler world of patterns and colors based on Pacific Northwest trees. My sculptures also are meant to remind us of the beauty that we are surrounded by and may not notice. They are composed completely of things I find on the ground, because even the patterns created by things that we walk over every day are beautiful in their own way. Psalm 150:6 says “Let everything that has breath praise the Lord.” Everything in Creation is praising God, from the tallest tree to the tiniest twig. My art is a little addition to that praise.https://digitalcommons.pepperdine.edu/enigma/1058/thumbnail.jp