Sunday, August 31, 2008

Cub Creek Residency & New Exhibit

With my recent acceptance to a residency program at Cub Creek, comes a rapid move to the foothills in Appomattox, Virginia. The rolling countryside here reminds me of the landscapes near my home; only more sparcly patched with the occasional tobacco field and vastly more expansive. I feel rather at home here and can confidently say that this place has a resonance of clarity and ease.


I walk these fields daily and while doing so saturate my self with the experience of this place. My mind runs thorough the images of my work evolving with every turn; a pliable and fluid thing to be developed as i return to the studio. My breath follows a relaxed tempo periodically molded by the approach of a deer, the hitchhiking cricket, or the shadow of a hawk who seems to scan the field for its next meal.




My feet touch the earth and the work here has begun. I have set up the studio and quickly moved on to exploring the surrounding environment. I have approximately one month to develop the work for my next exhibition. On September 22 I will travel to Norfolk, Virginia to begin the engaging process of installation and i have spent the past two weeks listening to the landscape that surrounds me. I am developing a relationship with the local ecology and have begun gathering and reclaiming the matter for my exhibit.







The Johnson grass is everywhere, it has taken over the feilds which were once the home of crops and before that territory of the forests that surround these plots of land. This grass is an annual and lives by producing seed, distributing its progeny by means of the wind, the rivlets of rain, and the movement of animals through its space. I am one of those animals. The seed attaches itself to my skin as a sweat in the midday heat and perhaps next season there will be small outgrowths of this grass around the resident housing and studios where there once was none. The inhabitatants of this place tell their stories to anyone who is willing to listen. And i will tell mine all the same. So i gather this abundant resource and i move on to sort and dissect; to listen and to explore. And in time to labor as my process takes me to the quiet and clam moments of patient articulation which becomes my work.









This work can be seen September 26th through October 26nd with a Opening Reception on October 4th @ Mayer Fine Art Gallery in Norfolk Va. on Waterside Drive.


The Smallest Footprint (ecologically responsible art)
Mayer Fine Art
Suite 252
Waterside Festival Hall
333 Waterside Dr.
Norfolk Va. 23510

Gallery Hours:
Friday: 4pm - 8pm
Saturday: 12pm - 6pm
or by appointment

757.803.4749
www.mayerfineartgallery.com

Saturday, August 30, 2008

i : artifacts of being : i



I recently been excavating and investigating the objects which present themselves to me in dreams. This work was recently created while persuing an independent study Virginia Commonwealth University. It exlplores a set of concepts related to my larger body of work which revolves around the central premis of 'being'. These objects have become the anchors of being and waypoints for the navigation of my own identity. The poems which i have written in the past seem to inform these works and can be found on this blog. I will be writing more in the near future to help keep track of my own exploration and the work that follows.