Using wood stripped bare of its bark and washed smooth by a Vermont River, I construct dynamic forms that invite contemplation. I have been attracted to wood since childhood when I studied the shrunken grey wood fence posts and X-shaped gate that held the cows in the barnyard of my father’s farm. My life was dried out and grey like the posts although I was attracted to their grainy patterns. I saw in them the possibility of transcending the visually dull world in which I lived.

As an adult I began collecting ‘dead’ wood on the beaches near my home. Finding its energy a surrogate for my emotions, I arrange the branches and limbs into bundles of particular feelings like solitude or anger. My work represents my struggle for sensuousness by transforming and revaluing a material which is often considered refuse into an object that is beautiful and alive. Coming from a deeply religious background, I create pieces that become the focus of meditation. Wandering within the landscape of my wall hung sculpture may be compared to the contemplation of a Buddhist Thangka. Some sculptures are formal compositions, others seem to have fallen in place by chance. The wood is assembled to create a subtle play of color in shades of bleached beige, silver and charcoal to make evident the beauty produced by the ravages of time.