There is an urgency for me in the act of painting. I revere (and revile) the luscious melancholy of Americana and rococo scenes. Wistfulness is the fear of loss—seductive and guilty. In the trappings of comfort, are we sedated by pasts and futures that didn’t exist, and may never? Through art-historical and decorative motifs, I construct a visual language for the haunts of desire.

Haunting not in a ghostly way (though, perhaps), but in the sense of persistent, as though the possibility of losing my sight makes me a beauty seeker.