Photography Collaboration: Artist Statment Attempt 1

My goal recently has been to lessen the separation of photography concepts from painting concepts in my process. Undoing natural barriers and smoothly connecting ideas from two very different mediums has proven to be quite challenge. Now, at the end of the semester I may have found my niche in combining photography and painting in an "outside" way. I am almost cheating my mind into believing that I am painting a picture, rather than photographing one.

The collaboration process was both intimate and immensely surprising at times. Finding, at the first try, a partner in art who is so naturally attuned to my process (and vice-versa) was breathtaking. As a painter who creates for her viewer, it was incredible for me to become both a viewer and a contributor to what was happening. I began to develop my own, separate concept of what painting on the body could mean. For me, it was becoming close to the painting by removing the separating factor of the canvas. Rather than painting in a triple (artist, paint, canvas) she had opted to paint as a partner equal to her paints. There was no go-between, she was in complete contact and control of her creation. I was merely documenting this partnership, offering advice from my personal experience as a painter.