My work is focused on power and the demise of empire. I make large scale drawings in graphite, charcoal, and pigments. Over the past several decades I have included popes and politicians, emperors and robber barons. The drawings are referenced by images I find relevant to the question of what power looks like. Some of the imagery is based on screen shots from C-SPAN videos of government proceedings. I crop the images as severely as possible to focus on the details I find most compelling: the cut of the suit, the microphones, the gilded decor. I work in charcoal for the power of the deep, unknowable void it can create. Scale is important to the depiction of power. My drawings are often the size of the wall. Other works are based on photos I’ve taken of the emissions from power plants and roman ruins. The smoke dissipates into the sky: ephemeral yet very much present. The ruins, too, are a reminder of the fragility of civilization. My intention is not to make explicit political statements but observations of the way power and empire interact.
