devotion to the unknown

In the summer of 1999, I had a conversation with an old friend, Francis Mitchell. I'd gone across the road to visit and found him outside at his barbeque. That morning, through the smoke and fragrance of the burning wood, I heard him say, "Art has always been about devotion to the unknown."

I use his phrase for a body of paintings that span about fifteen years, from the mid-1980s to the turn of the millennium. During these years, I got braver about painting from a silent, wordless source. I like to think I stopped pursuing the unknown and began to feel, instead, devotion to it.