My painting technique involves a great deal of sanding, scraping and overpainting. I dig into the paint to bring forth previous versions and gestures buried in the paint’s body, finding more content within the work. The abrading of the surface also implies that the painting occurred within time over an extended period, rather than in the instant of photography or the short time frame implied by a slickly finished oil paint surface.
Visual artists often become guides enabling others to become aware of the embodiment of nature within them. A viewer’s responses to aspects of an artwork may take him or her on an interior journey they never expected.
--James Shay
Many artists are able to grasp hold of nature as it reverberates within and can interpret, reinvent and express it, creating equivalents in art forms. For example, in nature there is an enormous catalog of basic visual forms and shapes and these are embedded within us from conception. Artists can become conscious enough of them to use the information in ways that are evocative and emotional. And artist’s methods of expression are within nature. For example, Joan Mitchell’s gestural paintings embody remembered motions from her distinguished youthful athleticism in figure skating, and Jackson Pollock said, “I am nature.”