Biography 

Embracing process and material, I make non-objective paintings that convey a sense of physicality, form, movement, and mood. While I have been influenced by a range of painters both abstract and representational, I find inspiration in nature, in things such as changing light, saturated color, the power of weather, and the open landscape. Scale is important to me. Monumental forms both man-made and naturally occurring have an undeniable presence, and I often make large scale paintings to achieve a feeling of grandeur.

 

Yet there is something intriguing to me about intimacy and craftsmanship as well, especially in the domestic--the everyday things that we live with which affect our lives. I am drawn to pattern and order. As a collector of handmade textiles, I am moved by the sheer beauty and enigmatic power these things can have.

 

            -I believe that paintings can exude there own mysterious power as images and as objects and as experiences.

 

Part of my painting process is intuitive and improvisational, resulting in ethereal atmospheres and physical sweeping gestures, while another aspect can be more calculated and tedious, mimicking the methods of pattern making and surface decoration more commonly associated with craft and design. Through a process of call and response, I add layers of paint to the canvas and then scrape, pull, subtract, re-build, dismantle and reconstruct again, creating paintings that are at once strangely familiar, yet decidedly non-representational.

 

Painting is now nearly second nature to me, though it is still a constant negotiation between bringing out the potential in the material and submitting to its inherent physical properties. In this way I view painting as a somewhat spiritual pursuit. My paintings can have vastly different looks to them. Some are soft and beautiful, others are tough and hard to look at. They are almost always difficult for me to define in words. Regardless of the results, painting remains for me one of the most direct forms of communicating non-verbal ideas that I have. In painting I am constantly asking questions that I usually cannot answer, and it is in this pursuit of the unknown where I find meaning in my life and attempt to make sense of the world around me.

 

 

 

 

CV

Education

2006                MFA, Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond, VA

1999                BFA, Kansas City Art Institute, Kansas City, MO

1998                Yale Summer School of Music and Art, Norfolk, CT

 

Solo Exhibitions

2018                Drawing Paintings, Painting Drawings, Haw Contemporary, Kansas City, MO

2017                Turn of a Slip, Orth Contemporary, Tulsa, OK

2015                Full Phase, Haw Contemporary, Kansas City, MO

                        To the Edge and Beyond, Roswell Museum and Art Center, Roswell, NM

2011                New Work, Dolphin Gallery, Kansas City, MO

2009                Obstacles, Marty Walker Gallery, Dallas, TX

                        Isolated Incidents, Dolphin Gallery, Kansas City, MO

2008                High and Wide, Acuna Hansen Gallery, Los Angeles, CA

                        Solid Liquid, ATM Gallery, New York, NY   

2006                Light Pollution, Peeler Art Center, Greencastle, IN

                        Darkish, ATM Gallery, New York, NY

2005                The State I Am In, Dolphin Gallery, Kansas City, MO

2003                The RAIR Paintings, Roswell Museum and Art Center, Roswell, NM

                        Something Amidst Nothing, Joseph Nease Gallery, Kansas City, MO

2000                More Real Than Real, Joseph Nease Gallery, Kansas City, MO

 

2 AND 3 PERSON EXHIBITIONS

2014                Sabotage, Levitt Gallery, University of Iowa, Iowa City, IA

2005                Eric Sall and David Kohan, ADA Gallery, Richmond, VA

 

SELECTED GROUP EXHIBITIONS

2016                Syncretic, 108 Contemporary, Tulsa, OK

                        Trish Higgins Fine Art, Wichita, KS

2015                Touched for the Very First Time, Lane Meyer Projects, Denver, CO

2014                9, Haw Contemporary, Kansas City, MO

                        AB FAB 2, Mulherin Pollard, New York, NY 

2013                Like, Davidson Galleries, Seattle, WA

                        Floater, BravinLee, New York, NY

2012                AB-FAB, ADA Gallery, Richmond, VA

                        Four Paintings, Regina Rex, Queens, NY

                        Wavers, Hauser and Nadeau, Brooklyn, NY

2011                Homage to Morandi, Brain Factory, Seoul, South Korea

                        What's Up, Dolphin Gallery, Kansas City, MO

2010                Informal Relations, Indianapolis Museum of Contemporary Art, Indianapolis, IN

                        Flying Hexagons, Lounge Gallery, Lafayette, LA

                        Summer Salon, ATM Gallery, New York, NY

                        Borderland Abstraction, Bemis Art Center, Omaha, NE

2008                East Moves West, ATM Gallery, New York, NY

The Possibility of Love With Strangers, Fakespace LA, Los Angeles, CA

                        New Angle, Bliss Hall Gallery, YSU, Youngstown, OH

            The Prom, Lawrimore Projects, Seattle, WA

2007               Red Badge of Courage, The National Newark Building, Newark, NJ

                       Material Presence, Marsh Project Gallery, Indianapolis, IN

                       Handcrafted Optimism, Bodybuilder and Sportsmen Gallery, Chicago, IL

2007               So Inclined, Denise Bibro Fine Art,, New York, NY

                       Homegrown, Southeastern Center for Contemporary Art, Winston-Salem, NC

2006               Homecoming, Nerman Museum of Contemporary Art, Overland Park, KS

                       ATM Art Fair, ATM Gallery, New York, NY

2005               Stick To Your Guns, Warehouse Row, Roanoke, VA

                       From The Root To The Fruit, Alona Kagan Gallery, New York, NY + 9, Plant Zero, Richmond, VA

                       Y-Topia, Byron Cohen Gallery, Kansas City, MO

2004               Chromo-Erotic, FAB Gallery, Richmond, VA

                       Group Show, Dolphin Gallery, Kansas City, MO

2003                Is/Was, Joseph Nease Gallery, Kansas City, MO

2002                Beyond Bounds 6: Shine, Gallery of Art at Johnson County Community College, Overland Park, KS

2001                Charlotte Street Fund Exhibition, H&R Block Artspace at the Kansas City Art Institute, Kansas City, MO

                        Space Oddity, Joseph Nease Gallery, Kansas City, MO

                        A House Is Not A Home, Epsten Gallery at Village Shalom, Overland Park, KS

1999                Karma, Joseph Nease Gallery, Kansas City, MO

                 

AWARDS/GRANTS

2006                Virginia Museum of Fine Arts Fellowship, Richmond, VA

2004                Joan Mitchell Foundation Painters and Sculptors Grant Program Award, New York, NY

2001                Charlotte Street Fund Award, Kansas City, MO

 

ARTIST RESIDENCIES / FELLOWSHIPS

2016-2018       Tulsa Artist Fellowship, Tulsa, OK

2014-2015       Roswell Artist-in-Residence Program, Roswell, NM

2013-2014       Painting Fellowship, Grant Wood Art Colony, University of Iowa, Iowa City, IA

2008-2009       Marie Walsh Sharpe Art Foundation Space Program, Brooklyn, NY

2007-2008       LMCC Workspace Residency Program, New York, NY

2003-2004       Urban Culture Project Studio Program, Kansas City, MO

2002-2003       Roswell Artist-in-Residence Program, Roswell, NM

 

COMMISSIONS

2010  Art in Architecture Program, U.S. General Services Administration, Washington D.C.        

 

SELECTED COLLECTIONS

Saatchi Collection, London, UK

Daum Museum of Contemporary Art, Sedalia, MO

Nerman Museum of Contemporary Art, Overland Park, KS

Anderson Museum of Contemporary Art, Roswell, NM

University of Iowa Museum of Art, Iowa City, IA

General Services Administration, Richard Bolling Federal Building, Kansas City, MO