I know photographers who say they take their photos “right” the first time; it looks like it is supposed to.  I wonder how they know?  

 

My camera is my sketch pad. I take lots of photos of things that catch my eye.  Sometimes I don’t know exactly why something is interesting until I see it on the monitor.  And sometimes it sits in a file for a long rest until I discover it again. Some of my favorite pieces are from photographs that are out of focus or the exciting bits are off in one corner.

 

I have been saving bits and pieces of digital information since I got my first computer (a very long time ago).  I combine photographic elements with other digital sources such as scans of paste paper, bits of failed paintings, newspapers with other alphabets; almost anything that would make an interesting background or foreground. These digital elements are added in layers to my pieces and I combine them with painting and drawing.   Sometimes all this works together and sometimes it doesn't but experimentation is the core of all art. 

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Once I decide the piece is “right” I print it on transfer film with archival pigment inks on a printer.  The film is flipped over onto birch pieces that are covered with medium.  The film is removed and only the pigment remains in the medium.  They are one-of-a-kind; transferring is not an exact science.

 

Lately I have been photographing old trees.  Trees that have lived longer than expected, trees that that have been damaged by weather, animals and humans, and trees that have been burned.  They are often good sculpture and are also metaphor for the lives we live.  Living through adversity we are still standing.  Damaged and beautiful.