Exhibition Statement: My dad, Bob, was a very handy man and an expert machinist. He would find and buy antique clocks for my brother and me to take apart. That was the whole task, just to take them apart. I suspect he and his brothers were given the same kind of projects by their father, my grandfather, a steam shovel operator, both to keep them busy and to nurture their natural, perhaps even genetic, mechanical instincts.

My own instincts, however, went in a different direction. Much to my parents’ chagrin, instead of leading me toward a trade, those clock parts sparked an artistic drive that has never let go. Objects in swirling vortexes, placed in meaningful contexts, became an obsession with the very nature of things and how they shape our reality. That obsession continues to occupy both my waking thoughts and my dreamscape.

I have to resist the urge to simply collect every object I am drawn to and instead focus on using them to create. The objects themselves seem to say, “Get to it. Make art with all of our fabulous presences. Turn us into a conversation you can share with the world.”