Born in Southern California, I spent most of my childhood years on Air Force bases. Sonic booms dominated the sound landscape of my childhood. As a resident of Riverside, California, I sense the vibrations of sonic booms and earthquakes regularly. When I was researching the San Andreas fault, I was fascinated by the visual imagery of a simulated earthquake. I have created those visual patterns with suminagashi, a Japanese paper marbling technique. Literally, the word means “ink floating.” The suminagashi layers are placed under layers of wax, like the seismic activity we sense underground. I made the marks on top of the wax using a stencil I created with vintage player piano rolls – music from the past, from another time of great social inequity: 1929.

Before we belong to a nation, a town or a family—we belong to the earth.

Soldiers have always returned home,

changed by their battlefield experiences.

Destruction occurs not only

in the war zone, it extends

to the communities

“back home.”

When will we acknowledge the true cost of combat?

Our bodies are vessels for the spirit

Our communities are vessels

that can hold and protect us

if we care for them.

The fabric of society

needs constant mending

and re-weaving.

Artist Statement

This work is a continuation of a body of work entitled: Connection, focusing on memory, history and narrative. The photo encaustic pieces developed from slides, discovered in the attic of my parent’s home after they passed away. They were taken by my father in S.E. Asia in 1966. He would often ride his bike into the countryside while overseas and take pictures while riding. These are some of those images.

Who is an ally?

Who is an enemy?

Delving, Struggling and Changing Direction are multi-media works which evolve from memory, history and narrative by visibly rendering how we are connected to events, to choices and to one another. I explore connection utilizing the form of a grid. A grid is both a framework and a network. At this time in our world, we see a profound disconnection between people, the lack of democratic political leadership and the earth under duress. This state of turmoil is felt at an individual level on a planetary scale. I propose that the lack of connection to the natural world originates with a sense of interpersonal disconnection.

The handmade paper crosses at the intersections of linen lines are composed of heirloom linen and abaca. They represent moments of choice and generations of choices. There is no choice without consequence. Some of these effects are seen immediately and other outcomes are initially invisible. These works show an earth that is no longer stable and predictable. Global warming is caused by billions of individual and collective choices which either take the earth further into mayhem or into the process of global healing. For many, the scale of global warming is too immense to comprehend, but we all have the power of choice.

This body of work focuses on memory, history and narrative illustrating how we as individuals are connected to events, choices and one another; even the disconnections have meaning. The materials chosen for the creation of the handmade paper have a personal connection to family and heritage. My overall vision is to explore and render visible how our connection to events, choices and one another is related to the creation of a sense of belonging and resilience.

There are many ways to describe a sacred space but no universal definition. We all experience and inhabit space in different ways. We may also have a specific sense of what constitutes “the sacred.” Sacred doesn’t necessarily mean religious, though it often does. It is something set apart, valued. Within a sacred space, there may be a feeling of belonging, a sense of oneness or trueness. These spaces can be found in nature or in manmade structures and it resonates to a sense within us. The sacred is not always visible, it is felt.