SHOREWARD is a collection of mixed-media, abstract paintings inspired by my preoccupation with the power of water. Having grown up along the Gulf Coast, I know water first as vital, essential to life, and a source of peace. The rhythm of waves mirrors some internal rhythm in me, in us. Yet I hold this appreciation in tension with a sense of impermanence and anticipatory grief as I watch rising sea levels gradually erase the places my family has called home.

These juxtapositions are present in the paintings as I often use hard edges––like palette knives, squeegees, and trowels––to scrape and blend paint into soft focus. Using primarily acrylic paint on canvas or wood panel, I build layers of texture through gestural brushstrokes, carved modeling paste, and found elements like sand. Mark-making with pencil, graphite, spray paint, tempera, and wax pastels adds detail and interest most visible at close range. Fluidity and movement are hallmarks across this collection, as are the coastal earth tones used throughout––calming blues and greens, grounding grays, spacious whites and sandstone.

I paint large work because I crave the sense of immersion found at the water’s edge that is always drawing me shoreward in good times and bad. I paint small work because sometimes shorter, fleeting moments of beauty are what is most accessible to us and no less crucial for our survival and thriving. Painting, for me, is a practice of embodiment and remembering to honor our human physicality in a world increasingly dominated by screens.

In addition to historic and contemporary painters––like Gerhard Richter, Joan Mitchell, Mark Rothko, Lanecia A. Rouse, Kyle Steed, and a’driane nieves––my work is heavily influenced by memory, music, books, and poetry. Late in the process of creating this body of work, I encountered a poem by Mary Oliver that conferred on me its title: