Artist Statement

I uproot inspirations from life events that cause me to express my strongest emotions. The subject matter could be anything from medical situations, home life, and/or personal relationships. These situations are usually ones that cause great stress, anxiety, and/or feelings of an overwhelming nature. In my work I show the boldness of emotion through a vibrant, sometimes primary, color palette using mediums such as oil, acrylic, watercolor, colored pencils, and pens. I also like to keep a raw intensity with some of my works with leaving the material exposed that I am working on.

Pertaining more to my oil paintings, the material I paint on is very important and often dictates the compostion. Occasionally, I find large, discarded, rugged pieces of wood that have a unique physical presence and stand on their own leaning against the wall to be displayed. These pieces could range anywhere from 5-10 feet tall. I do works on paper and canvas as well, at times using found or cheap materials such as bubble wrap, plastic, and blue jeans to either paint with, or include in the medium. These materials became a cheap, easy way to develop experimental work along with being accessible and easy to find.

My compositions are often psychedelic. They are erratic, claustrophobic, and weave in and out of both figural and spacial elements. This gives evidence to my scattered, unorganized thought process, or as some call it, A.D.D. My work carries a particular balance between an expressively aggressive way to apply the paint combined with graphic, linear qualities that move the viewers eyes in and out of the entire work to feed the purpose of an overwhelming composition. I’ve been told my works remind people of Dr. Suess' illustrations, Munch’s “The Scream," and Pink Floyd album artwork, which is by Gerald Scarfe, who is also a political cartoonist. I see these examples as great, formal inspirations to my work along with hand drawn animations from the 1990’s. Surrealism, German expressionism, stained glass, morbid topics, and the super natural are also examples of great influences to my work, along with artists such as Salvador Dali, Alex Gray, and Picasso. A very important influence that should not be overlooked is a band called Tool. Their radical lyrics and spiritual concepts have been an artisticly tharapeutic impact on my mind since the 5th grade. My main goal with creating psychedelic, overwhelming artwork is to occupy the viewers eyes and mind for as long as possible. I want to leave the doors open for their imagination as well as mine, and also allow the viewer to discover new elements everytime they gaze upon my work.