Carry Very Little.
In 2024, a set of ordinary life stages were presenting themselves: I turned 50, both of our children left home and my parents’ aging was necessitating closer attention. I felt spent from the previous years of collective loud opinions and certainties. I wanted to turn off the input that was inarguably modifying my mindset and behavior, and return to my own curiosities and observations. I wanted a reduction; in most things. I left Instagram, followed the media less, and I started making the CVL paintings. I wanted to feel spare and calm when I engaged with them.
The color of the panels felt organic and earthy to me; and I felt drawn to materiality that was less architectural and cold than my previous series. The tone was reminiscent of sun-baked mud and the clay of my grade school art classes. The numbers and marks came instinctively; as I regard them now, I see them as a response to my overwhelm of numbers and statistics. My brain was craving the math of my early life; basic arithmetic, geometry, amounts and quantities that I could conceive of.
