...Of wisdom and reason

I recently met a wonderfully talented artist named Bradley, and this is his 93 year old grandmother. It was also probably 93 degrees outside which is a known killer of ice cubes and soft-serve ice cream cones. We had to jump Bradley's artistmobile so she was kind to allow us to use her car to fire life into it. As I sat in the backseat I quickly sketched her as she and her grandson chatted away. She reminded me of my grandmother, who passed away a few years ago. My eyes stung from the flood of my own remembered past.

People often tell me that my work is much more than just well-drawn images, that they get a much deeper sense of feeling from them, they see life; and I now know the reason for that.

Every line I draw, every color I choose, each time I put my hand to paper, or paint or crayons -- I am showing you that I am many, many people. I am my mother who paints beautiful landscapes and animals. I am my father, who could ressurect a pile of rust to its former glory as a car which provided Sunday drives on warm summer days or transform lumber into a house or barn. I am my grandmother, who made Hungarian nut cakes and crocheted doilies of such precise beauty and delicacy to rival anything from a museum. You are looking not at my work, but at the work of countless mathematicians, loggers, cooks, musicians and laborers who did what they did so that I could sit here and show you through the magic of technology what happens to me when you give me a pencil and some paper. It is to them you owe your compliments and admiration; I simply channel all their creativity and intelligence (I HOPE) and perserverence into something that gives tangency and meaning and pays homage to their long lost existence so no one is ever forgotten.

This is why I am an artist; the reason I am here. It took 47 years to see that which was always sitting right in front of me, and how glorious a feeling that is to finally know who I am, and what I should be doing.

Imagine -- all of this just from sitting in the back of a car in 93 degree weather with two people I barely know on a summer day in Seattle. Thank you, Brad -- and Brad's grandmother, for showing me this, and you don't even know yet that which you have done.

ink, 6" x 8"

July 2007