I paint from imagination, even though the final image always resembles the “real” world in a general way. For me a painting always begins with an intuition of how simple motifs like trees or a repeated pattern of railroad ties might be distilled into something fresh that comes across as both abstract and representational. A freight car is an efficient conveyor of goods, but also an interesting arrangement of shapes and colors, something with a potential for visual poetry. As Morandi said, “There is nothing more surreal and abstract than reality.” In a sense all painting is still life—silent, but alive on its own terms.
