mixed media

MIXED MEDIA

Mostly watercolor and colored pencil, I completed this mixed media work (13X14") my senior year of high school in 1997. "Amaphiko Okundiza" (Wings to Fly) continues to inspire and empower me. VISIT MY CONTACT PAGE to buy your own 14X14" giclée canvas print of it for only $50. OFFER EXPIRES APRIL 30TH!!

I just finished "Propel," a 9X9" study of the wing-like nature of a maple seed. This includes watercolor pencil, watercolor, acrylic, wax medium, and more. VISIT MY CONTACT PAGE to buy your own 14X14" giclée canvas print of it for only $50. OFFER EXPIRES APRIL 30TH!!

"Lumina" is another piece I finished this April, focusing on the light of freedom that shines in dark places. Originally 12X12", the butterfly is a colored pencil drawing with shimmer acrylic paint added, and the background is done mostly in oils, experimenting also with mushroom prints. VISIT MY CONTACT PAGE to buy your own 14X14" giclée canvas print of it for only $50. OFFER EXPIRES APRIL 30TH!!

Seven by Seven Series

I started working on these pieces while earning my Bachelor’s in Creative Writing & Fine Art from Marylhurst University, around the same time I joined Mosaic Church (2004). I studied artists (like myself) who use writing in their art, making the case that “textual artists” who create in such raw, self-exposing ways are seeking to heal themselves and often inadvertently lead others to healing in the process. I called these squares my "seven by sevens" when I discovered one day that they were roughly seven by seven inches. I decided to create forty-nine works, and displayed them in a grid as part of my senior project.

The squares are mixed media done on watercolor paper, then glued to wood and cut out with a radial table saw. The process of doing them was very therapeutic for me, right down to the sanding and covering them in wax medium! They were a way for me, at the time, to sort of "purge the noise" that was in my head and come to “still points” you may notice here and there. Seven became a significant number for me during that time. It symbolizes completeness (I was FINally graduating from college!) and it was the number of years since a significant friend’s suicide that I was finally processing in a healthy way. On a spiritual level, I was noticing how that number in the Bible was associated with God’s call to us to rest (Gen. 2:3, Heb. 4:6-11) and to forgive (Matt. 18:21-35) and these were huge messages to me at the time.