Photo by Andrew Brilliant

ARTIST STATEMENT:

Body and soul, I am drawn to the magical qualities of water. I have chosen to work in watercolor and monotype, because they best evoke water’s flow and swirl. I especially love the spectacular beauty of the deep sea, as experienced SCUBA diving in the Caribbean. The undersea series in my online gallery expresses the joy of weightlessness, the beauty of the otherworldly flora and fauna, the unique colors and light, and the peace of the deep that I experience 100 feet below. The tragedy of the Deep Horizon oil spill has moved me to begin work on a new series based on imagining the whereabouts of the oil that is still unaccounted for.

Walks along Jamaica Pond in Boston and the Cape Cod seashore nourish and sustain me; the art in my landscape gallery conveys the peace and strength that I find in nature. Sculpting the light through the media of watercolor and monotype, I try to evoke the texture, glow, and multi-hued washes of these landscapes that renew my spirit. Trees in particular have been my muse. To me, their physical grace echoes and amplifies the beauty of the human form, and I find meaning in trees’ ability to renew themselves by continually growing new limbs.

See Vita for information about my training and recent exhibits.

MY WATERCOLOR MONOTYPE TECHNIQUE

On my way out of town for a diving trip I stopped by the art store to pick up supplies, and on a whim bought a pad of a synthetic paper called Yupo. Made of polypropylene, the paper’s plastic-like finish resists rather than absorbs watercolor paints. Painting a beach scene on Yupo I was soon hooked by the watery effects that were created by swirling watercolors around and letting them dry on the smooth paper. When I got home and shared my paintings, a friend suggested running a painting through an etching press onto dampened paper, in effect using the Yupo paper as a monotype plate. I have been experimenting with the technique ever since, delighting in the velvety textures it produces. All of the work in the undersea gallery is done using watercolor on Yupo.

ABOUT MONOTYPES

A monotype is a form of printmaking that produces a unique, one-of-a-kind image - unlike other printmaking techniques such as lithography that can reproduce a series of exact replicas many times. Often referred to as the painterly print, or a printed painting, monotypes are known for their spontaneity and translucent quality of light. The medium appeals to me because I never know exactly what I’m going to get – and most of the surprises are happy ones. I also love the amazing textured effects that come from applying everything from bubble wrap, the heel of my hand, or autumn leaves onto the wet ink on the plate before it is run through the press. I find the colors very beautiful, especially as they are layered on top of each other.

My oil-based monotypes in the landscape and floral galleries are made by applying etching ink to a piece of Plexiglas ™ with a brayer (roller) or brush – then running dampened cotton rag paper through a press on top of still-wet plexi plate. I can sometimes get a second, paler printing from the same plate, and this is called a ghost. I often apply more layers of ink and run the plate through many times.

Some of the works in the landscape gallery are carborundum monoprints. These are made by painting a pasty mixture onto the plate before inking it. The paste includes carborundum grits – what sandpaper and emery boards are made from. When this mixture hardens, it adds unusual textures that can be seen in several of the pieces: Gold Lit Forest, Forest in Black and White, and Earth Brown Forest. Although the terms are often used interchangeably, a monoprint differs from a monotype in that the plate retains some consistent image from print to print, as these carborundum monoprints do.