
Breath on Glass
I have fallen in love, as of late, with painting on glass. It is like a reverse sort of exhaling onto a window pane, then drawing into your own breath. The pieces I paint are like the breath of my being. I attach prose and poetry to them because they are the breath of a moment. I add sound because it is what transfixes us to time. Glass, breath, light, sound at once fleeting and then also eternal. We hear, we see, we feel in a second, the sensation dissipates then it returns with more force; the initial interaction the full force shattering, we think it’s over, then it trickles back into our spirits, thoughts, hearts incrementally collecting and coming back together.
This idea of life through window panes, on the outside looking in, on the inside looking out, fully engaged or far removed, reflections held in the glass like memories is intriguing to me. More than a fly on the wall that sees and goes away, the windows hold the images forever. They are the eyes, the passage to the soul of a place. Could we step through them to another place? Could they connect our time in one city or moment or memory to our life in another? And if they shatter, are those memories gone, freed, released, forgotten? Do they disappear like a vapor?
I see these things in painting on glass. I see it as a capture of the ephemeral. I feel them in writing the prose. I feel them like I am pinning the temporal. I hear them like my breath in sounds...songs, footsteps, heartbeats, traffic, birds singing. I hear them as if recording a fleeting moment in time.






