My work is especially guided by a desire to play with the formal tensions between the deliberate and the accidental. I am compelled by the allure of surfaces that have been accidentally marked, and am generally very interested in the accumulations of layers, veils of color, drips, texture, and scratches that come with time, usage and decay. I want my paintings to contain marks that I know are deliberately chosen for the way they contribute to the total composition, but which appear to be purely accidental. It is in finding harmony among these elements that I find beauty and mystery.

The bulk of my inspiration comes from the surfaces of previously owned, time-worn antique objects. Often I imagine the stories that go along with these objects. At yard sales, for example, I love to be regaled with stories of the previous lives, uses and histories of the objects for sale. I find these stories enlivening and enriching. These experiences inform my work by way of analogy. In a sense I recreate this kind of experience by making my paintings. The enjoyment of my work comes from a similar accumulation of visible signs of life, incident and accident, where every mark and detail is a forensic record of my own experience with the materials. In each layer of my paintings I can see the story of their development and the way that they were made.