Possibilities: Big Skies and Last Good-byes

A New Installation

Enjoy a beautiful collection of my new work at one of Toronto's best and hottest java spots.

 

Crema Coffee Co., 3079 Dundas St., W.,

November 6 - December 10, 2008

Mon-Fri 7am-7pm, Sat & Sun 8am-6pm.

This image: "Field of Hope" 36X60, acrylic on canvas

Big open skies

I am currently mesmerized by the ever-changing gossamer layers of skies. No doubt this is fueled by a growing need to feel big open spaces full of possibility. I have been a sky painter since I was little. The first painting I ever sold at the age of seventeen was a darkened sky and a heron; wings spread in preflight glowing by the light of a giant moon.  As I write this, I see flocks of birds through my studio window. They fly in formation against the clouds, changing colour in waves from deep indigo to shimmering gold as they dissect the sun's diminishing rays. Like the clouds, they are both close enough to touch yet impossibly beyond my reach.   

Didn't Get to Say Good-bye, 36 X 48, acrylic on canvas

Fish is fish

36 X 48, acrylic on canvas

The biology of beauty

Why is it I can look at or create something and know it is beautiful? What inner workings must awaken to be moved by what I see? It is a question I cannot answer intellectually to my complete satisfaction. I have to feel it.

There was a time I considered us to be essentially spirit and that our biology was just the mechanics. Now, with advances in science that clearly show we respond to and are driven by certain physical attributes - even scents - in our selection of mates, and that we seek out a  specific immunological landscape that will produce the hardiest offspring, I have begun to think it is biology that determines our essence. Fundamentally speaking, the mechanic is in the driver's seat. 

Its not much of a romantic notion to contemplate everything one does, believes, thinks, seeks out and expresses is determined by physical make up. Yet, I do see this as somewhat miraculous. Wrapping my head around such infinite complexity for more than a few minutes at a time inevitably leads me to be ensnared by the dreaded hair-ball of conflicting ideas.  Still,  I can't help but wonder...is the key to truly understanding ourselves found in understanding beauty (whatever that is)? This is what I explore in my work.

36 X 48 acrylic on canvas