24 Hours in the Life of a Small Red Bird
Color-aid paper; Acrylic and oil on canvas
2005–2015
“If one says ‘Red’ and there are 50 people listening, it can be expected that there will be 50 reds in their minds. And one can be sure that all these reds will be very different.”
Cutouts
24 Hours in the Life of a Small Red Bird is my first collection of cutouts made with Color-aid paper. The focus is an exploration of the color Red. I conceived of the cutouts as painted haikus. Each cutout was constructed as a 9” x 6” rectangle representing one hour in a 24-hour cycle. Every scene features a male cardinal going about the business of his daily routine. The abstracted setting and color palette shift in accord with the circadian rhythms of Mother Nature.
Paintings
This series of 48” x 36” oil paintings evolved from the initial set of 9” x 6” Color-aid cutouts. I wanted to allow the color and image more breathing room. For this process, I adopted the procedure I developed for the Pulse Pattern paintings. First, the pattern was projected onto a stretched canvas. Next, the color palette was developed with acrylic paint to match the Color-aid swatches. The final coats were painted in oil paint, mixed with an alkyd resin medium to create a flat, enamel-like surface.
