Visual Counterpoint
Whether representational or abstract, painters use changes in color and light to subdivide a surface into a network of shapes. Depending on how the shapes are combined, a single pigment can appear flat or part of a dimensional image. While painting, I constantly shift between organizing a set of flat shapes on a surface and constructing the illusion of spatial depth. Conditional on which action dominates, every mark has the parallel potential to render or unravel an illusion.
Choosing what to emphasize and what to discount, painters construct new realities that reflect their individual perceptions as much as the visual characteristics of the subject matter. Observations may seem spatially illogical, visually obstructed, or abruptly partitioned, co-mingling depth and flatness within a single field of vision. Thus, I pursue representation and abstraction alongside each other—searching for pictorial resolution while indulging visual inconsistencies.
