She asked me where I found the patience to do the work, a question I don’t think I’ve been asked. I did not have a ready answer. Since then I’ve been thinking about her question. Where do I find the patience, being a restless, anxious type? I’m thinking patience is akin to focus and that focus requires a quiet mind, so the question has morphed into “How do I quiet my mind.” The best answer I have for that is to give the mind something to do while I do something else.

All artists have various tricks and techniques to get into the studio and work. Mine has been to clean and organize the studio or clean the house before I start a session in the studio. Here are some other ways I’ve found to quiet the mind and, therefore, give me patience:

Counting
Washing dishes
Weeding the garden
Repeating the same task over and over (pretty much how I do a painting)
Taking a really deep breath before I touch brush to canvas
Playing with my dog, Zack
Sweeping the floor

The subjects of my paintings are color and perception. The six panels of Work Group1 (2008) continue my investigation into subtle differences of light and color (color being a quality of light) through the use of multiples.

The work is divided into three diptychs. Each diptych’s final color is the same, only the underpainting differs. The final colors were applied thinly and loosely using transparent or semi-transparent colors. This causes the top color to mix with the color underneath in the viewer’s perception, subtly altering the perceived hue. The color perceived does not actually exist on the surface of the painting.

Another result of working loosely is that the sufrace color appears flat at a distance, yet closer is actually many colors which distance blurs.

Installation View

Installation view