The Kelp Project
A Selection of ongoing Monoprints & Paintings
2019-current
An observer having always had an activist mentality; I am internally motivated by rapid climate change and the degradation of the planet. My two concurrent projects, From the Deep - a love story about Kelp, and The Vespula Project - I am a Wasp, seemingly are not related but together represent a pursuit of bearing witness and practicing empathy towards the non-human world. Transforming a subject deemed to be a “pest” or a “service” to society, I offer alternative stories to the viewer.
As a biologist, I observed my subject and collected data that went to a courtroom to affect changes in law. As an artist, I transform my field sketches, writings, and photographs into works hoping to affect change in the viewer’s psyche. Layering transparent and opaque inks, altering viscosity, using collagrapy and monotype; I am able to react to the color, depth, and form that appear with each successive print. A series format allows me to further explore a topic with each rendition. Repetition pushes an idea well past the intended outcome. Striving for each piece to be part of a larger body of cohesive work, yet also wanting each piece to be able to stand on its own formally. My printmaking practice informs my painting practice.
From the Deep, grew out of a personal history of daily interactions with the kelp of the Pacific Northwest where I live. What better way to describe and understand any one of my personal transformations than to find a subject that is in itself an agent of transformation? Atmospheric carbon dioxide is captured and sequestered by kelp forests. Deemed an ecosystem service to humanity, these kelp forests are an impenetrable tangled mass that is rich with color, life, meaning, and design.
“Long swirling blades tracking the movement of the water’s motion. A circular whirlpool dissipating. Pulling the water cape further around me. Not like wind, but like wind would feel if the air was thicker. Roundish shapes bob and weave breaking through to the no-color sky. I no longer focus on myself.
Streaming now; How far do these underwater stipes go? How do they feel? Where did they come from? Where are their edges? Do they know that I am here?
Remembering now; What do I feel now? What do I see now?
I think questions like these have been hounding me for a very long time. I think that I have tried to answer them in many ways, through many avenues, for most of my life. I want to depict it somehow. I want to share it so others will find themselves asking themselves the same questions. I find it best to focus long and hard on the the natural world around me to get closer to an answer.”