Contact body prints, acrylic on cotton, 81″ x 94″, 2024
Contact prints of the body have a tradition in sacred arts, often functioning
as evidence of the physical existence of divine or holy persons. We know
the Shroud of Turin, the footprints of Buddha and Mohammed, prehistoric
cave hand prints, and the thumb print signature. The message of the hand
print, foot print, or body print is “I was here”. There is also a sense of a
straightforward image not interpreted by the artist’s imagination: a direct
impression.
The process of making the work involves one or more actual contact body
prints. I put paint on the model’s body, and press it onto a surface. Then I
paint color around it and in layers over it, working further with brushes, my
fingers, airbrush, and splattered painting techniques. The layers, adding
both physical and metaphorical substance, enhance the original print, as
well as building up a glow, so that the aura becomes luminous.
The body is a site of life and death struggle. It is through the body that we
experience pain and ecstasy, immanence and transcendence. I draw upon
those spiritual traditions that honor living in the body. My art evokes
complex and intense emotions both joyful and troubling, and intensely
spiritual. I seek to invoke in the viewer a sense of awe for our existence.
My art connects emotion, spirit, and body. Nudity in my art is not simply
sexual display. It expresses honesty, openness, and freedom. I work so that
my paintings would bring a shift in consciousness – a spiritual experience –
in the viewer. I seek to invoke a sense of awe for our physical and psychic
existence.