Artist Statement

My work is about light. When I was a youth I would draw for hours on end. I used to fill pages with chaotic patterns until there was no space left. With each new piece the pages gained nuance, the expression gained texture, and as my work matured I began to notice that the space I initially strove to fill was allowed to be left open. I find that It is within this space, that pretends to be empty, that something is at play. There is this something that hides between words that refuses to be heard or written. My art is about making room for that.

My practice is informed through my lifelong study of traditional cultures. As a child my summers were spent visiting the pueblos, mesas, and reservations of Native American communities. As a young adult, my fascination shifted to the study of Japanese language. It was during my studies in Kyoto that I became aware of how language guides tradition. I later found that the strength of tradition I felt in Japan shared a nuance within the Islamic crafts. So, as an adult I traveled to the sites of many of the historic Islamic empires throughout the Mediterranean to study the visual languages present there. Though initially unconscious, I have found that this method of learning tradition through direct experience has no substitute.

My research is an inquiry into the methodology of the traditional designer, the visual storyteller. I approach this work through the lens of the inventor, which is a tradition that goes back over a century in my family. This lens is a playful one, that is open to inquiry, experiment, and discovery. When I look to the Alhambra in Granada, the minarets of Cairo, or the mosques of Istanbul, I notice that each is adorned with a distinct language. Each language is speaking a story that unites these spaces into separate, but cohesive frameworks. Yet where are the new languages? If there was going to be a new story, what would it look like? What stories have been forgotten that are awaiting their return? What are the designs that have been lost to time?

During my MA studies at the King’s Foundation School of Traditional Arts I began the ambitious task of creating a new pattern language. Based on the structure of curvilinear roundels found throughout medieval Andalusia, this language is a geometry of curves rather than straight lines. The overarching characteristic of this system is that it expresses an orbital nature, that holds a space in the center. It speaks through the analogy of silken threads, the veils that glimmer in the periphery, It speaks of starlight. This language is an homage to the unseen blessings that hold the world together.