6/ Avian Witness

This series of aerial-view abstract paintings has developed as part of my ongoing response to the increasing competition for space between the natural world and the manmade environment. As our wild areas are shrinking, those primeval forces such as animal migration, magnetic pull, and wind capture my imagination. How birds adapt as development increases informs these paintings. They now often migrate over vast built-up expanses of large cities. Many of their territorial landmarks have vanished, forcing them to recalibrate their familiar migratory routes.

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The vibrant and intricate geometric bands in this work allude to the roadways and other development that interferes with habitat. Yet in my work, the built environment evokes a nuanced history, evolving from ancient indigenous footpaths to superhighways. The underlayers of paint begin with silkscreened facsimiles of 19th-century handwritten text. These letterforms symbolize language and culture, and bits of black text peek through to the surface of finished paintings. On the uppermost layer, sinuous drawn lines reference the migratory movement of birds. The contrasting systems of mark making intersect randomly, at times conflicting with each other, just as birds sometimes collide with buildings. While creating these works, I envision how human development and natural forces might coexist in harmonious ecosystems.

Installation, “What the Nighthawk Knows,” Echo Arts, Bozeman, Montana

Painting with bright rectilinear marks with curvilinear lines on white ground.

2017, oil on three panels