encryptions

2005

I didn’t know what I was doing—though by this point, I knew that not-knowing was part of the point. These were made toward the end of this early period, when I was experimenting more deliberately with repetition, structure, and illegibility. I was drawn to grids and glyphs, to bright shapes outlined in oil stick, floating against a dark field. Around this time, I was watching a lot of Stargate SG-1, which may have nudged me toward these coded, hieroglyphic compositions.

If Words and the I Ching paintings cracked open language, these took a step further—toward marks that feel meaningful but won’t yield to translation. Not quite writing, not quite pure form. A kind of encrypted gesture.