P A I N T I N G S
Beauty Hath Deceived Thee and Lust Hath Perverted Thy Heart
Susanna and the Elders was a common artistic theme in the sixteenth through the eighteenth centuries allowing painters to paint erotic scenes without condemnation from the authorities. The lecherous elders in this version are replaced by satellites, symbols of scientific advancement as well as surveillance. Susanna is depicted by a 1940’s pinup-girl suggesting the history of the modern sex symbol. The title refers to the content of the painting as well as the use of beauty to seduce the viewer.
The Decolonization of Reason
Mixing images from both Eastern and Western cultures, this work symbolizes the epic and eternal battle between belief systems. In some Asian cultures, the dragon is seen as a powerful mystical creature. In China, it is the symbol of the emperor. In the West, it represents an evil to be conquered. The title refers to how the West has used logic and reason as the paradigmatic foundation to all knowledge of truth (a patronizing position that by default suggests the East is more primitive and less intellectually evolved).
The Star Planters
Out of the Big Bang, dualistic constellations emerge: the hero and the apocalyptic antihero, technology and nature, science fiction and historical fact. Fusing Tibetian Thangka painting, cowboy poetry and the scientific origin story, this painting represents the origin myth of religious scientism in the West.
Every Act of Creation is an Act of Destruction
Based on the painting “Virgin of the Rocks” by Leonardo Da Vinci, this painting addresses how Environmentalism has become the apocalyptic archetype for an emerging, quasi-scientific belief system in mainstream culture. A belief system that transcends national and cultural boundaries.
The Future will be Better Tomorrow
This painting is a response to how the apocalyptic fear of environmental collapse manifests in popular culture. Comic books, movies and television often express these fears with far-fetched story lines and impossible science. By appropriating images from both Eastern and Western art, I hope to call attention to the global impact of this new apocalyptic mythos.
He that Increases Knowledge Increases Sorrow
The burning of books leads to the burning of people. This work illustrates how new communication forms change how we understand the world and sometimes lead to chaos.
All is Vanity and Vexation of Spirit
Will our hubris and vanity be our undoing? or will we be reborn from the ashes of environmental catastrophe.
In Much Wisdom is Much Grief
Bettie Page is presented here as the modern goddess with reference to the pagan goddess religions. She represents a dichotomy, an objectified sex symbol and a feminist icon. The ancient goddess represents the natural forces of fertility (sex) and destruction (natural disasters, death) The snake is a symbol of the goddess that was vilified by the christian patriarchy “the snake in the garden.” Based on renaissance depictions of the Power of Women topos like Judith and Holofernes
The Triumph of Irreversible Time
Has our long history of conquest and the consumption of resources led us down an irreversible path to environmental destruction?