“Imitation is suicide.”  This quote from Ralph Waldo Emerson has often comforted me during my quest to find my own artistic voice.  My artistic inspirations and processes often differ greatly from many of my esteemed colleagues.  While most artists are visually-oriented, creatively charged by what they see, my stimulus rarely emerges from triggering sights.  Instead, words and sounds propel me to create.  These audible influxes result in the development of mental images and then are transformed into artworks.  In my process, word lists and webs are nearly as vital as thumbnail sketches.  The same may be said for intricate lyrics or moving poetry—steady intake of these things is fundamental in the creation of my work.

            Inspiration for me begins with a word, or a song, or a discussion of some sort.  Beneath topics that force me to debate, or even listen closely, lay the subject matter of an art piece.  Rather than yielding to the impulse to cover all my images in text, the challenge becomes translating verbal messages into an understandable visual language, so to speak.  Thus, my work becomes a speech or dissertation about the things I observe and desire to comment on.  The intention of my work is not solely to persuade the viewer to think of the world as I do, but simply to think—to challenge “norms” that they have accepted as fate, and to realize how much impact they can have in making truth the “norm”.