ARTIST'S STATEMENT
My works focus on the explorations of scenes of destruction or the chaos of creation, both real and imagined: the aftermath of a battle, a post-nuclear landscape, a lull in a firefight, the birth of a star. The paintings often take on strong color fields, frequently cut by a sharp horizon line. On these horizons, there is a kind of restlessness, as if something is happening or about to happen.
On a blank canvas, I see negative spaces, mapping shapes and color fields. I often explore the searing contrasts of a streak of orange or red or blue against a dark landscape, or a white mist against landscapes of color. In more recent works, I merge clean, functional lines or modular planes with both organic growth and technological decay: breaking waves, rolling mists, creeping vines, and bolts of electricity on the one hand, and corroded circuitry, derelict spacecraft, rusted robotics, and deteriorating hardware on the other.
I work with acrylics and incorporate found objects in my art-making process, if not the final work. My process is often a journey from darker shades to light, and moving from the broader strokes of mapping aggressive color fields, to the painstaking work of revealing the nuanced layers of highlight and shadow.
I draw from my background in architecture and industrial design, in particular the sensibilities of deconstructionists like Peter Eisenman. The works of artists Zao Wou-Ki, William Turner, and H.R. Geiger also influenced me in my early years.
I am also strongly influenced by my martial arts practice. My early works were heavily informed by the zen aesthetics of my early traditional Karate training, and my later works inevitably followed me as I shifted to more modern combat and self-defense fighting systems — tactical systems like Israeli Krav Maga and, of course, Kali, that are still used on the streets and the battlefields today and as such, hold a somewhat bleaker, if more practical, view of the world.
In more recent years, my fascination with the aesthetic of post-apocalyptic imagery has had a strong impact on my work. With destruction comes the implication of new beginnings, the proverbial rise from the ashes. This tension and interplay informs my work and my art-making process, as the narratives of hope from destruction, order from chaos, and rebirth from the wreckage play out on the canvas. 🟧