Artist Statement, April 2011
I often think of my work as a series of happy accidents. Whatever plaster
and material structures I put into a large aquarium take on a different
character when the tank is filled with water. As paint is added to the
water and starts to flow about freely there is a randomness that is only
somewhat controllable. This presents an extra issue in the Waterfall series.
As we all know when we think of waterfalls, water flows from high to low in
the landscape.
Occasionally I make a model for the tank which is not thought out but more a
spur of the moment project. The Waterfall series is a body of work I mulled
over in the back of my mind for more than three years. This is the norm for
me. I think about an idea but I don't actually act on it for some time. It's
not so much the technical issues though they do play a part. It's more the
feeling of how it could work visually or what I might try to put across.
These are never exacting ideas but more results of what you could call a
dream state where specifics are connected to the general memory of the dream
but not necessarily in a rational fashion. In other words I'm not thinking
of a specific waterfall but one that reminds me of every waterfall.
Considering the addition of water to the contrived landscape and the
randomness of the flow of paint in the water, I have only a minimal idea how
the final images will come together or what look they will engender. I just
know they will be reminiscent of waterfalls.
Though there is a part of me that enjoys being mesmerized by a waterfall
even though it is somewhat of a cliché, for me there is no greater waterfall
than the one my father took me to on various occasions at age 5. That would
be Niagara Falls in upstate New York. For me those visits to the falls were
among the most powerful visions of childhood. Not only the tremendous flow
and fall of water to the bottom but the noise and the constant spray still
haunt me as to the beauty and power of nature.