Before The First Kiss Painting

Reflections about mental, emotional, and social struggles caused by mood, personality disorders, and depression dominate my current work. I am fascinated, on one hand, by human resilience to overcome the most horrifying life experiences while on the other by super sensitivity and fragility of our minds, souls and spirits that can be broken down and destroyed by a single word, act, or event. Making art helps me respond to and overcome my own mental anxieties, demons, dark sides and long “blue” episodes in a healthy way. When painting, I primarily use mixed media including oils, acrylics, fabric and spray paint combined with an array of ready-made, found objects, and simple building materials such as caulk, insulation boards, and foams. I try “breaking” away from the medium’s standard two dimensional flatness and rectangular shape as well as making my pieces without beginning and end or top and bottom or left and right. Consequently, they stay open ended, float in a current of time and eventually find their own unique position or place, just as humans are constantly in transition, opportune since the moment we were born, searching for true purpose, meaning, solace, inner balance and peace. My present mixed media work explores two major themes. The first revolves around sometimes real but often imaginary mental bridges, thresholds, gates, barriers, walls, blockades, obstructions, boundaries, obstacles that our minds create which in turn negatively impact our lives. The second signifies inner “battles” with unstable, ever doubting, self-destructive thoughts caused by conscious and unconscious thought processes, our insecurities, and life events. At the same time, I constantly examine my compositions and manipulate their formal elements in search of the most impactful use of line, negative and positive space, color and texture. With each new piece or series, I keep challenging my preexisting beliefs, opinions, and biases about human experience while discovering new truths about myself and cues for subsequent exploration. In turn, my work becomes the mirror reflection of my evolution as a person.