Hammer Painting

I was born in a small town in northeastern Wisconsin. I remember always being drawn to the arts. I went on to graduate with a degree in architecture. I worked as an architect for 25 years, for many of those years I focused on high rise commercial projects, cresting many major architectural wonders that dot the skylines of London, Shanghai, Barcelona and Chicago. In 2008 i retired from architecture so that i could paint on a full time basis. In the first couple of years i did several group shows and numerous solo shows. I consider myself a self taught painter. My first love was and greatest early focus was in Abstraction. My beginning works were architectural in nature. I departed from that when i realized the constrictions and limitations of the architectural form. Eventually I discovered the human form as a subject matter. I found the human form to be a hierarchy of structures but believe that a painting starts with a gesture re-inferring some of the symmetry and nuance my original training. I like to start a painting with a field of human gestures, then i go back in and exploit the more pronounced shapes in the human form. From here I am that fine line between abstraction and realism. The shapes and forms I emphasize start to add patterns and direction to the painting. It is here that abstraction takes over and the original gestures of the human form take on a new language.