Mine is an observation-based art. I admire theory but it is experience that I trust. My work is therefore not considered fashionable or avante-garde. I could not care less. There is a parallel world out there of serious, excellent art and that is where my work resides.
Whatever the underlying motives of ‘landscape art’ (political, spiritual, commercial, decorative etc.) it has always presented us with work that offers either a frozen kind of experience (a ‘snapshot in time’) or a stuttered, disjointed kind of experience (time-elapsed art). But we know that environmental experience is neither. Instead it is a seamless continuum of movement and change. Everything we know of from quarks to the universe, everything in our visual frame, everything that is available to consciousness is clearly moving in real time. As an artist committed to authentic environmental art I worked hard to imbue my paintings with these understandings. And then in 2003 I began a search for new ways to express them. This is why I created Revolution, Watch and Horizons.
Revolution, Watch and Horizons are made directly from observation to record what I see accurately, spontaneously and without addition or subtraction. In this way the wind, the rain and the sun are in the driver’s seat, not me. Close attention to our environment has shown me how each day evolves day to day, hour to hour and second to second. Every moment is unique. Nothing is ever repeated. How could it be? Nature knows nothing of repetition.
We inhabit a dynamic and rapidly changing environment and how we image it says a lot about how we relate to it. This is no small matter. The way we relate to a changing environment is perhaps the most important issue of our time.