Growing up in northern Wisconsin, many days of my
youth were spent wandering through the endless woods in back of our house.
I have always had a fascination for trees; those that grow perfectly straight
and tall, some that have lumps and bumps from scars of the past, some that
curl themselves around rocks in an effort to survive. I would often wonder,
“What made these tree roots climb and twist into a knot? If this tree
could speak, what stories would it tell us of its past?”
Many evenings as a child were spent sitting around the campfire in our backyard.
Old dead branches would be collected from our woods and dragged down the hill
to be burned. As we’d sit around the fire in the evening, the embers
would begin to glow and flames would leap and dance around them.
We would discuss with our family and friends the images that we saw in the
flames. As an adult when I return home to visit, we still continue our traditional
evening campfires. One night, it struck me to capture a glimpse of the dancing
flames on film. These photographs were so inspirational that I began to paint
the fires. Part of the joy of my fire paintings is discussing the imagery
that viewers see in the flames. Depending on each person’s background,
different people see completely different images in the same painting. People
often wonder if the images were intentionally put there and the answer is
“no, everything you see is from your own imagination”.
Through my paintings of wood and fire, I strive to tell the story of trees.
The trees I choose for my wood paintings are not the ones that grow straight
and tall, but the ones that twist and turn and have character. An analogy
can be made here with the life of humans as well - the ones that are the most
facinating are those that follow a different
path. The fire paintings capture a moment of a tree’s last opportunity
to tell the story of its life. Each branch and log burns differently depending
on the denseness of the wood and the presence of any knots and blemishes.
The images that a viewer perceives in the flames are a reflection of their
own inner vision.
