“Working with my hands is bred in the bone. Using textiles in my art making and their tactile qualities has a grounding effect for me. They bring me back to that place of possibility.”

 

I was born on the north shore of the St. Lawrence River in Quebec and spent my formative years on Vancouver Island.  I grew up in a home where my parents did everything themselves and by their example, I learned that I could use my hands to make things too.  As a child I ran wild exploring creek beds where I caught tadpoles and chased salamanders.  I spent endless hours riding my bike along narrow back roads and passed long summer days swimming in the Georgia Straight.  It was a time of infinite possibility and when I work in my studio I get that same feeling.

I am inspired by Wayne Theibaud’s brush strokes and the rhythm of Dorothy Caldwell’s mark making.  My designs imply the subject instead of stating it directly. The works are process based and the surfaces are imbued with hand hooking, screen printing, and stitch.  Each hand hooked loop is a brush stroke.  Each deconstructed screen print takes me into the unknown and every stitch attempts to unify the overall image.  The materials and techniques inform one another, layer upon layer.

An important part of my practice embraces the past.  While some of my work moves beyond the notion of what a traditional hand hooked rug is, others are purely functional.  Making the hand hooked works connects me to the past in a way that is hard to put into words.  It doesn’t constrict or inhibit my work in anyway.  What it does is simply acknowledge that I am part of a continuum.  I am able to do what I do because of a legacy created by thousands who came before me.  It’s fundamental.