the unfolding

A backstory.

Fawn // mixed media on linen 58" x 48"

I rarely approach painting with a fixed plan. Not because I’m a free spirit, but because the work doesn't listen to plans anyway. It insists on becoming what it wants to become. My job is mostly to keep showing up and try not to get in the way.

Fawn is a record of that—messy, layered, and full of detours.

It started as a forest of antlers. Then a boy in a cape. Then a winter scene, with the boy cradling a small animal—a rabbit—maybe? And eventually, a small white fawn. The boy receded, still present, but ghosted beneath layers (and layers) of paint and wax. The piece carries its history quietly, but it’s there: the weight of what was added, what was taken away, and what remained.

That’s how this process goes. It’s not aimless. It’s observational. You make a move, step back, look again. Sometimes you paint over something you love. Sometimes what shows up in its place feels like it was always there—you just hadn’t seen it yet.

I’ve always trusted that part. The unfolding. The uncertain middle. The slow shift from no idea what this is to there it is. If the surface holds something real, it’s because the work lived through something to get there.

Fawn isn’t a grand statement. It’s one part of a longer conversation.

That way of working—of listening, layering, allowing—still shapes everything I make. You can feel it in the Overstory series too. Different subject, different materials, but the same slow unfolding. The same trust in what reveals itself with time. Less narrative, more elemental. Less about holding a figure, more about holding light.

You can view Overstory here.