Every time I discover a nest it is always a moment of awe and wonderment   It’s as if a curtain has been pulled back and I’ve become privy to something miraculous.  I felt this way when I was five and I will still feel this way when I am one hundred and five.

In the same way, I am drawn to encaustic because it also allows for serendipitous discoveries.  Layering, fusing then scraping the pigmented wax is a laborious process with images arriving sometimes by accident sometimes by intention.  The element of surprise, the unpredictability of the final outcome is what fuels my work.

I am often questioned about the medium. Encaustic, from the Greek enkaustikos, means to heat or to burn. Beeswax, pigment and heat are its source elements and together I find them endlessly fascinating and artistically fulfilling.

Beeswax and Damar resin are melted, color is added/blended, and applied with brushes sometimes thickly, sometimes thinly, each layer going from liquid to solid in a matter of seconds. Each layer is then fused with a heat source, usually a heat gun or blow torch. Layers are scraped (archaeological / excavation / mystery – going deeper and deeper) and applied, sometimes as many as a dozen times. The depth and luminosity achieved with encaustic painting is unmatched.

My hope is that my work allows viewers to experience a sense of childlike curiosity and astonishment – something the world is sorely in need of.