Wiese XII, encaustic monotype on Japanese paper

Deeply inspired by the beauty of flowers and landscapes, I push my subject to a place of gestural abstraction. Sweeping gestures are heightened by bold saturated tones. The process of mark making, color choice, and composition happens mostly subconsciously. It matures to a gestural dance revealing my utmost authentic voice, a dreamlike reconfiguration of emotional meanings.

The resulting work is vibrant, complex, and meant to make intimate connections with the audience, invoking both my vision and feeling of a world where beauty and vulnerability are the touching keystones.

The Encaustic Monotype Printing Process

I am painting on a hot aluminum plate with liquid beeswax and pigments. The image is transferred to handmade Japanese paper by placing the paper face down on the plate and hand rubbing it with a Japanese burin. The loose fiber absorbs the wax and the image bleeds partially through the backside. After the paper is pulled from the plate, I wipe the plate clean, paint the next image, and print again. One monotype is made of multiple, close to 100, unique printing processes printed on both sides of the paper.

I print in sections, since often the paper is larger than my plate, plus the printing process is challenging. The already printed image re-melts each additional time I put the paper down to add another detail. Often, I roll the paper up and only print the still white paper areas in order to keep the already achieved design crisp. At the very end, in multiple runs I print the backside of the paper to create the back-ground color.  

The paper gets translucent and saturated with the pigmented wax. The colors are uniquely brilliant and luminous and metal pigments sit as an embellishment on top of the paper.