ABOUT ME
New Mexico is home for me and informs so much of my work and perspective. When I was very young, we lived on the edge of a small town. I would walk to the edge of our front yard and look out at the plains that held nothing but the horizon. The spot on the edge of this abyss was known as Dead Man’s Alley to all the kids in the neighborhood. Why, I’ll never know. When I was 10, we moved to Las Cruces, NM. Again, my parents moved us to a house at the edge of town, looking out over the desert. At night the lights of El Paso twinkled in the distance. Wide open space became a part of me. I am always working to create that space, that quiet breathing room in my life and in my art.
My Mom was a diligent artist and crafter, always taking on new projects and learning new mediums. During one particular period, she was taking classes and painting at a workshop in an eclectic old house where the shelves below the tables and all the shelving that lined the walls were covered with jars of paint and stacks of magazines and papers. I was fortunate to tag along and just entertain myself while she was busy. The air was filled with the heavenly smell of turpentine. The ambiance was magnificent; a vibrant, joyful, fire hazard filled with women who had beehives of teased and lacquered hair. I was hooked.
While my mother fueled my passion for the arts, my father modeled for me a dream lifestyle. As an insurance salesman to farmers and ranchers, he burned up the New Mexico highways. His travels took him to Albuquerque, Sante Fe, Taos, Farmington, Roswell and oh so many other exotic places in the state. I envied the lifestyle, the space, the freedom. He got to travel all over the Land of Enchantment, its peaceful prairies and majestic ridgelines, and got paid for it! It’s no wonder that I would be so drawn to traveling to art fairs.
After a few twists and turns in life’s plot, I earned my BFA from the University of New Mexico. I studied painting and metal arts, and immediately began the process of developing an art jewelry business with my wife and life art partner, Mary Filapek. We have collaboratively created several bodies of work together in both jewelry and fine art. We both have a love of art, nature, traveling and of course, wide-open space.
STATEMENT
Like a lot of humans, I love color. Color feels like a mission for me. I want to understand every facet of it: how colors interact with each other as hue, tone and saturation mutate. I want to experience how color affects every aspect of myself and how others may experience it. In my art I am constantly playing with the balance between creating space, peacefulness, vitality and playfulness.
I work with simple, playful abstract and geometric forms, along with stripe patterns that allow the color to take on layers of dimension. I strive to allow each piece to have a complexity that unfolds for the viewer with new information.
PROCESS
My paintings are a process of layering acrylic paints on wood panels. I create the initial layout in graphite pencil and integrate the pencil work into each layer of the work. Layers of texture are added to create structure and depth.
Recognition
Silver : Coconut Grove Arts Festival : 2024
Bronze : Coconut Grove Arts Festival : 2023
