Artist Statement

I feel that all painting is a portrait of the artist. Art heightens our life experience and it offers a spiritual insight to all that we are. The root of my work stems from the influences of my educational and spiritual upbringing in Southern Utah. I began my formal art education at Dixie State College at the age of fourteen. In those days the most unique thing about my art work was my age. At this stage of my education my paintings are experimental and reflect my continued growth as an artist. My sole motivation and interest lies in painting portraits, beginning with a well selected composition.
Over the past few years, oil has become my medium of choice and becoming a representational artist has been my dream. I realize that much of my artistic talents can be attributed to the intensive training I received while painting numerous portraits over the years. I strive to interpret the subject with a full range of values, a harmony of warm and cool tones, a saturation of color, a balanced design with an accurate drawing beneath it all.
Representational art, as I practice it, needs no interpretation. Concept artists create distortions on purpose, but there is a part of me that suspects figures clumsily painted without depth and dimension are just poorly drawn. From the beginning, I’ve been fascinated with the way artists make shiny things look shiny and glass objects appear transparent and water appear reflective and wet. Hands that look like hands intrigue me, and portraits that are recognizable as the people they represent seem the ultimate manifestation of a painter’s skill. I have spent hours in the studio learning to edit and interpret the vast quantity of information from a live model into two dimensional lines and values.