I embrace the accident in creating my work. I am fond of Jasper John’s statement: “Make a painting. Do something to it. Do something else to it.”

My recent body of work, “The Album,” explores concepts of family, memory, and constructed narrative. The works in this series were originally inspired by photographs in a 100-year old family album inherited from my Norwegian grandmother. These found images are heavily altered and manipulated in the finished works which combine photography with mixed media and painting. I think of “The Album” as a trans-generational project—the past reaching forward, the present reaching back. As in all of my work, there is a suggested tension between those portrayed and their depicted environment.

While the original photograph is what initially attracts me, I do not visualize the finished image when starting a new piece, but rather work within a very loose structure that allows me to explore my own psyche during the creative process. This method of working allows me to go from the specific to the ethereal and imaginative. In effect, the work does not exist for me when I begin it, but comes to life, on its own, as I work with it.