Sand Paintings, 1983-1986

I am interested in pictographic communication, from contemporary graffiti on urban walls to ancient pictographs and petroglyphs. My work references Egyptian hieroglyphics, ancient roman signs, traditional hobo signs, and spray-painted graffiti, as well as self-created pictographs. I am especially drawn to the use of hands as symbols. Gestural language is one of the earliest forms of communication and images of hands are often found in pictographic cave paintings and petroglyphs on rocks. 

In these Sand Paintings, I incorporate the expressive qualities of ancient and modern pictographic symbols with the emotive qualities of color and gestural signs. In my studio, I use my hands to draw and submerge various pictographic objects in sand, crafting narratives that relate conflict, danger, fear, and security, as well as other emotions and ideas. I often create my own pictographs or take contemporary objects out of their normal context in order to create a unique symbolic language. After photographing these sand paintings created in my studio, I print them as large black and white mural prints and then hand color them. The prints are then framed in a mixture of sand and acrylic—a tactile nod to the media in which the symbols were created.