imageThe Concept of Energy and Spirituality:  My approach to painting – collage making is a thread that runs throughout my early career to present.  For example, when I was drawing the human form, I convey the energy-spirituality in the curves of a woman. The build-up of line structure and movement is my spiritual approach to Romanticism. Energy-Spirituality is the culmination of color, movement, rhythm, dance, music, time, life, and death.

I am an artist who is driven by a passion for knowledge, self actualization, and spiritual growth. That means my artistic practice is directly linked to my spiritual practice—those rituals that allow me to access the unlimited resources of my soul and imagination.  I use a language of symbols and parables within my abstract work to represent a spiritual manifestation of the highest form of divine energy. I use art as a tool to raise human consciousness and empower my audience with an experience that enlightens the mind, body and soul.

I create my best work as I mediate about the global black experience in the modern world while immersing myself in the sounds of Jazz and African Diasporic music.  The choice of themes and ideas derive from my spiritual and intellectual response to the energy that comes from music and the spiritual realm.

My spirituality-with the help of my ancestors- has allowed me to create art.  My parents, grandparents and adult family taught me the foundations of my spirituality. As I see it, my art comes from the energy of the spirit world. I ask myself how the creation of art manifests itself into reality.

As with most artists, my painting/art making approach evolved from life experiences.  I grew up in Arkansas and Missouri during the ‘50s, ‘60s, and ‘70s. So, I have first-hand experience with Jim Crow in America.

I believe art emanating from spiritual energy transcends the earth thru space and beyond the universe. As I make art, I journey into other – worldly thoughts—traveling the universe through the process of color. I always play music on this journey- Blues, Gospel, Jazz, Reggae and World music. My spirit –energy transcends space and time and when I feel I have journeyed to the universal limits, I discover there is always more to see and create.  The idea of infinite possibilities empowers my visual imagination.

— May 2016