About six months ago, I began a series of paintings with the underlying thought that my ex-husband was near death. I wanted to work intimately with that idea. See what would happen. So I took some photos of him as a child, him with me on our wedding day, with our children when they were very young, and also some of him in recent years. I had these photos silkscreened onto canvas and I’ve been gluing pieces of these onto the canvases. I then have to look at his face as I begin painting. And look at it again and again. Ultimately the face is obscured as I transform it into . . . art, going beyond the elements that make it.
The photos did effect my work, it seems. I can’t explain exactly how. But it is visible, a different kind of energy. Not morbid at all, quite the opposite, very lively.
Well, now that the main subject of my “investigation” has gone beyond, I’m eager to start some new canvases and get back to work.