Copper Series - Large

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The luminosity of nature inspires all of my work. 

These abstract landscapes are painted directly onto sheets of copper that I first formed into low reliefs. Hammering the gleaming copper feels like sculpting light as I pound the metal with my rounded hammers to flatten, stretch, raise and imprint textures onto its surface.

The translucent tonal colors that I paint over this luminous topography reflect the metal's light and energy outwards and creates a dialogue between light and form.

Their overall compositions are abstract, however, these wall-mounted low relief paintings might suggest aerial views of valleys and tree-topped ridges, desert terrains, rock formations or oceanic swells that evoke pristine landscapes and the tradition of Romantic landscape painting. It seems inconceivable that they are now so threatened. 

The edges of the thin copper sheets that rise and curve along the wall allude to the thin living crust of the earth. Copper, a fairly common element, has been mined, extracted and hammered since pre-historic times. Modern industrial copper mining is extremely damaging to the environment, though once smelted, copper can be recycled indefinitely. The sheets I use are industrial discards. This gleaming metal, conveying both light and heat, expresses my awareness of our climate precarity.

To emphasize their textures and ridges I have left a series of larger low reliefs unpainted. These pure copper works can be placed outdoors.