Commissions & Commemorative Pieces
Years ago when I wasn’t cranking out as much art as I do now, I’d only make something as a gift for someone.
Writing, playing music or doing artwork was always intricately tied to my personal relationships.
Sometimes this was a challenge — and for a while I struggled to do things “just for me.”
Ultimately though, this connectivity to others has been a gift.
It comes to the fore when I’m doing commissions or art pieces for special occasions, allowing me to tap into the unique qualities in each person or event in such a way that the artwork becomes more interactive — a live and ongoing celebration.
Or you can commission me to create a legacy piece for your home. This next piece is an example of what I created for my own family. Check out my artist notes below.
Family Tree: Artist Notes
This mixed media collage is composed of letters, telegrams, personal cards, scanned photos and decorated envelopes made by three generations of my family members from the 1920s through the 1980s. You might say this is my equivalent of an heirloom patchwork quilt, given that I lack the patience for sewing.
Several in our family have been artists, writers and humorists by trade, and absolutely everyone made their own cards, illustrated their letters and decorated their envelopes. We’ve called this penchant for prolific doodling “genetic intensity.” 
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The hills in the background are made from a favorite old summer shirt my father used to wear: as if, going outside to lie in the grass, I could still rest my head on his shoulder…
While these snippets of communication give only a glimpse and a guess at larger life details, you can still find a sense of the whole in the torn fragments. And while these fragments might “mean something” only to those in our family, what I’ve found is that many people resonate deeply with them anyway.
Perhaps it’s the idea of family in general. We long for belonging, and for ways to make sense of all that generational stuff in our lives. Maybe too it’s historical synergy kicking in — that ancient yet mysteriously personal vibe that we can sense as we make contact with objects and places where others have gone before us.
Ultimately, our life experience does resemble this patchwork of wildly placed pieces. (Do you know anybody who really “has it all together?”) My life isn’t always neat and tidy, but it’s a treasure in all its imperfection; the darks and lights and half-discovered bio-bits combine to offer their own beauty and give deeper understanding as I go along.
…Want your own unique family tree?
