The Tyranny of Symmetry 2016 oil, stucco, and wood 70x80 cm
Abandon All Hope 2017 oil, stucco, wood 56 x 75 cm
What There Was 2017 oil, stucco, and wood 30 x 114 cm
Janus 2016 oil, stucco, and wood 120 x 80 cm
The Limits of Vision 2017 oil, stucco, and wood 49 x 120 cm
Enclosure 2017 oil, stucco, burlap, and wood 72 x 110 cm
untitled (gate 4) oil, burlap, and stucco 35 x 51 cm
untitled (gate 1) 2018 oil, stucco, and wood 67 x36 cm
untitled (gate 2) 2018 oil, stucco, and wood 26 x 38
untitled (gate3) 2018 oil, stucco, and wood 29 x 41 cm
Abandon All Hope Ye Who Enter Here!
“All hope abandon, ye who enter here.”
Such characters, in color dim,
I mark’d
Over a portal’s lofty arch inscribed.
-Canto III of the Inferno
I use literature in my art in many different ways, sometimes an idea from a novel will be the impetus for an entire project, at other times I will use specific lines from books as titles for pieces that are inspired by them, while some of my projects take on the linear narrative sequence of literature. One of my influences is Dante, who is already such a visual author that the illustrations of the Inferno, by artists as diverse as Doré, Botticelli, and Dalí, are made to look similar by the strength of Dante’s imagery. His idea of “contrapasto”, that the experiences of people while living are mirrored in their afterlife, is closely tied to the alchemical idea that things are “as above so below”, which is a recurring theme in many of my paintings.
Such characters, in color dim,
I mark’d
Over a portal’s lofty arch inscribed.
-Canto III of the Inferno
I use literature in my art in many different ways, sometimes an idea from a novel will be the impetus for an entire project, at other times I will use specific lines from books as titles for pieces that are inspired by them, while some of my projects take on the linear narrative sequence of literature. One of my influences is Dante, who is already such a visual author that the illustrations of the Inferno, by artists as diverse as Doré, Botticelli, and Dalí, are made to look similar by the strength of Dante’s imagery. His idea of “contrapasto”, that the experiences of people while living are mirrored in their afterlife, is closely tied to the alchemical idea that things are “as above so below”, which is a recurring theme in many of my paintings.