Recuerdos

My work is rooted in the experience of growing up in the 50s in Germany and the United States. This was a time of innocence, faith in the future and an underlying anxiety of nuclear annihilation. A time when fairy tales and old-world myth intermingled with the promise of magic of science, with its rocket ships and the power of the atom.

I select images and icons from the 50s and place them in juxtapositions that resonate with the duality of innocence and malevolent power. Children's books, toys, and other artifacts from my past are an inspiration and resource for my symbology. My experiences in Japan have also been important in shaping my current work. I love the way text is applied to image in strange, and often random ways there -- particularly when the image has been appropriated from Western culture. The duality of ancient and modern life coexisting produces startling content.

One of the cornerstones of my work is the layering of images. The finished pieces have a tactile quality that makes them seem as if they were constructed out of velvet or felt. This is achieved through layering and painting out, or erasing, images to create depth -- both literally and conceptually. This often unconscious process of selecting and deleting images produces a palimpsest like surface. Beneath this surface lie the sometimes sinister, sometimes comical clues needed to unravel secret codes of content within the work. There are hidden images that both confirm and contradict assumptions we have made about interpretation. These artworks function as a reminder of the world we were promised as children, and a visual record of my search for understanding in that world as an adult.