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| Primitive Realism |
| My work has always been difficult to categorize because there are both primitive and traditional elements to it. I started my schooling as an art historian and later went to the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts to study drawing and painting. My early work is flat and colorful, filled with personal messages and symbols. My later work has become more realistic and deals with more universal subject matter such as religion, politics and ecology. I am currently painting in more traditional genres such as landscapes and cityscapes. These paintings show my interest in the natural and human environment.
The best example of my early work is my life cycle paintings of my mother. There is one painting for each decade of her life. They are painted in a flat, colorful fashion. The figures are taken from old photos. There is a cartoon like feeling to these paintings. I always strive to reach the universal through making a personal connection to my work.
My later work has become more realistic and less personal in subject matter. I completed a cycle of paintings of Barbie and Ken growing up in the projects in Philadelphia. There are many religious allusions in these paintings.
During this same period I was working on cityscapes with printed words intermingled throughout. My printed landscapes try to show relationships between the city and the suburbs.
I have always been saddened by the violence around us and completed a series of paintings using toys and natural landscapes to portray my feelings on this subject.
My most recent paintings show my concern for the environment in city and rural areas.
My work always strives for the universal through paintings in a series with a narrative content. All my paintings have primitive patches mingled with the traditional rules of western art.
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