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The choices we make and the circumstances that contextualize these choices are often repeated, seemingly adding up to form and inform who we think we are and how we function in the world. However, outside of humanist constructs we are at a lost to find an absolute reality, making our lives a relative experience that is potentially both meaningless and meaningful.

I attempt to point to this relativity of existence and to the ways in which humanity gives meaning to life, specifically, when life transforms to death and when death transforms to life. This deconstruction of the self and the world utilizes concepts surrounding language that support relationships among religion, philosophy, psychoanalysis, and nature.

Heavily influenced by my study of Tibetan Buddhism that began with a semester abroad in India, Nepal, and Tibet, I became fascinated by the concepts of existence, death, and consequence within Tibetan culture, and ultimately as a foil to the religion I was brought up in - Catholicism. This comparison led to my supposition that religion is a human-made construct, while simultaneously marveling at the intricate imagery and visual language of various religious and cultural objects.

Through Freud and Lacan, religious imagery and rituals became signifiers. Additionally, numerous links between existentialism and Tibetan Buddhism became apparent as I explored the works of Nietzsche and Camus. Consequently, much of my work is created under the guise of every choice as valid, and in a sense I became the “absurd artist”.

Linked with existentialism and Buddhism, the absurdity of choice is also clear in nature. Each living creature on earth is perfectly designed to survive and function in relation to the creature itself, to other living things, and to its environmental components. Every choice in terms of design has been attempted and then fine-tuned, making the workings of nature a model for my creation as I bring my artwork through various births, lives, deaths, and rebirths.

Fester

2006
Reductive woodcut, aquatint, & hard ground etching
10.5" x 14"

Untitled

2006
Lithograph with charcoal

Accruing Merit/Consequence

2006
charcoal and chalk pastel on paper
24" x25"

Sky Burial/Ashes to Ashes

2007
chalk pastel, oil stick, and oil paint on paper

Choice, The Absurd, & Consequence I

2007
cut out pieces of one etching, vellum, mylar, & india ink

Choice, The Absurd, & Consequence II

2007
cut out pieces of one etching, Rives BFK, & india ink

Fester/After Life

2007
oil stick and oil paint on canvas

Accumulate, Fall: Fall, Accumulate

2008
Lithograph with Sharpie, ball point pen, charcoal, & chalk pastel
19 x 28"

Sketch 1

2008
Ball point pen & paper
7 x 4.5"

Sketch 2

2008
Ball point pen & paper
7 x 4.5"

Sketch 3

2008
Ball point pen & graphite on paper
4.5 x 7"

Sketch 4

2008
Ball point pen & Sharpie on paper
4.5 x 7"

Sketch 5

2008
Ball point pen & Sharpie on paper
4.5 x 7"

Untitled

2007
india ink, graphite, acrylic and oil paint, charcoal, & gel medium
28 x 31 cm

Untitled (page from "Devotional")

2007
etching
5 x 7 cm

Untitled (page from "Devotional")

2007
etching
5 x 7 cm

Untitled (page from "Devotional")

2007
etching
5 x 7 cm

Untitled (page from "Devotional")

2007
etching
5 x 7 cm

Transubstantiation

2006
etching
35.5 x 38 cm

Transubstantiating

2007
charcoal, graphite, chalk pastel, on a soft ground etching
35.5 x 38 cm

Small Protector

2006
charcoal on paper
25 x 25 cm

Milarepa's Cave

2008
india ink & acrylic ink on paper
25 x 28 cm

Grave's End/Fecundity

2009
india ink & litho crayon on cut-out paper with tissue paper and lithograph
30 x 38 cm