I use locally foraged earth pigments from stones, ochres, clays and botanicals found around Santa Cruz and Watsonville to make abstract and representational paintings. They come from wild, windy cliffsides, serene creeksides deep in the forest, and 500 feet deep under the ground, unearthed by the digging of water wells. After the intimate process of foraging these pigments from our nearby environment, I grind, levigate and mull them into paints, using the traditional tempera technique with egg yolk as binder or handmade watercolors with foraged binder of acacia or plum tree gum. When using the handmade mixtures, I try to let the expression of the paintings embody the nature of the pigments themselves, as what they are made of is a part of what they are about.
The land in which I respectfully gather these precious pigments is within the unceded sacred indigenous homelands of both the Awaswas- and Mutsun-speaking peoples from which the modern Amah Mutsun Tribal Band is descended. This land is known to the Amah Mutsun as Popeloutchom.
The land in which I respectfully gather these precious pigments is within the unceded sacred indigenous homelands of both the Awaswas- and Mutsun-speaking peoples from which the modern Amah Mutsun Tribal Band is descended. This land is known to the Amah Mutsun as Popeloutchom.
