A sketch.

Timothy Emelyn Jones told me, “Make a list. Title it: ‘Words That Apply’.”

I look through my last three series: the work I’ve done in residence at Burren College this spring; the drawings in Returns (2012), a joint show with other returning Pittsburgh artists David Grimm and Mia Henry; and my work in my first solo show, On the Threshold, from the fall of 2009. I try to explain myself.  

“Words that Apply.” Dreams apply; so much of my work is based on dreams. Animals, sleeping human figures; hauntings. I draw animals in combat, and the quiet of the Himalayas from memory. In another drawing, I face off against myself, with opposing animal natures as my cast shadows. I tell stories; I illustrate fictions that I don’t quite know or understand. Folklore is a word that applies. So is mythology. So is memory. And through all of it I try to tap into a realm that’s “in between “– something between waking and dreaming, between dreaming and dying.

Formally, I work in monochrome. I like charcoal for its messy nature, for its expressiveness. Its bold, undeniable presence is felt in kohl sticks; it evokes ghosts on the page in willow and vine. Ink, and ink wash serve to blur the lines, to leave drips, to remind that it’s not quite real. It’s still a drawing. It’s only pretend, like a dream that you swear is real life, until you wake. The edges blur, the image begins to drip until it’s washed away by mid-morning, swept under by the logic of daylight.

Mark Rothko once described the way he would like his viewers to see his work. Ideally, one stands no more than twelve or fourteen inches away from the canvas, so as to have one’s field of view engulfed by the work.  I was so taken by this when I read it my freshman year of college, that even though I was making small things, that description lodged itself into a crack somewhere and began to emerge years later. For the last five years I’ve been making exclusively large work, for the same reasons as Rothko. I want my viewer engulfed, captivated. I want my viewer to go home haunted.

In my work, I try to describe my dreams. I see beautiful visions and dark shapes when I sleep. I think the unconscious mind is a fascinating thing; I think we know much more than our conscious mind would let on.

When my mother became ill and underwent a series of life-threatening operations, I had to face the truth of her mortality. I had never thought of it before; in my lifetime I had only ever had three people die, and my parents had protected me from the reality of death by leaving me at home for the funerals. Seeing my own mother nearly gone on a hospital bed was a rude introduction to Death and our tenuous grasp on this world. So I escaped into sleep. Twelve, fourteen hours a night, I dreamed vividly, feverishly, just so I wouldn’t have to be awake. I saw prehistoric horses, and wolves, and jackals. I saw the Virgin Mary, and dark shapes that crept into the room, and demons.  I began to understand, and come to terms with all of it.

I don’t know what it means to write the perfect artist’s statement. I’m twenty-six; I have only just begun to verbalise my intent with my work. I, like every other creative who has ever lived, make work because I can’t help but to make work. Figuring that out is the easy part. I will spend the rest of my life explaining my intent as it takes shape, and then, five or ten years later, razing it and starting over again with a new one. The core will always be there.