The subjects I paint are unremarkable — utilitarian structures, nondescript buildings and interiors, landscapes and seascapes — ubiquitous in our experience and imagination. But I try to reveal them as singular, strange as well as familiar, disturbing as well as commonplace. I will often paint several variations on one theme. Though the images appear “realistic,” they are simplified and abstract archetypes. Architectural forms are symmetrically arranged. Color is mostly monochromatic; light, tone, and shadow vary with time of day and place. Often, there is a sense of foreboding. Where the human figure appears, it is isolated and anonymous, persevering in an indifferent universe. One subject, to which I’ve returned time and again — the Holocaust — is hardly “unremarkable.” Nevertheless, despite the near impossibility of expressing the inexpressible, I have felt compelled to try. My paintings have been metaphors for a particular view of reality: We exist in a seemingly orderly, if incomprehensible, universe — to which we are entirely incidental. Its meaning, if there is any, will continue to elude us. In one song, Peggy Lee asked, “Is that all there is?” My answer, as my work would suggest, is yes. I find myself guided by Hopper’s view of art: “It’s not hard to paint a design,” he said, “nor to paint a representation of something you can see. But to express a thought in painting — that is hard.” And, I would add, to convey an emotion is even harder. Paintings_Holocaust_2.htmlPaintings_Holocaust.htmlshapeimage_1_link_0

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