ARTISTS STATEMENT
My work, whether referencing poetry, theology, or myth explores relationships between story, language and figuration. The acts of reading, writing, and looking- each direct focused attention to cognitive speed, the influence of memory and the power inherent in the layering of allegory and image. The challenge of aligning silent reading or the spoken word to both still and moving imagery is of particular interest in ongoing collaborations with contemporary poets.
Formal decisions relating to size, accessibility, and composition have been influenced by a study of medieval illuminations especially in Books of Hours. Here, embedded moral histories, spatial constructs and coded iconography together far outstrip the capacity of text alone to function as a cultural repository. Illuminated books occupy pride of place on a literacy timeline and mark a rare intersection where the visual stands as an equal with its partner-text. The portability of these volumes, which ingeniously unify the secular and sublime, have had a significant impact on the scale of my work and it’s content especially in the light of new technologies.