​I invite you to be still.  To notice.  The shape and line of a tree as it leads both to the sky and to the ground.  Notice the light and how it filters through a tree and that same light looks different if you are in the open Valley fields or deep in a Mountain trail.   Notice the enduring rocks along the coast or central Oregon, rocks that have been here for ages, whose change is imperceptible to our life time and remain through the joys and sorrows of our short lives.
These were words I grew up with, coming from my father.

My work often centers around nature, but more than that, it centers on holy places.  We all seek them, and are inwardly drawn to them, apart from any religion.  Institutional religion will  try to capture and define these places, think the cathedrals of Europe reaching to the skies with tall columns mimicking the trees and forests that once surrounded them. These buildings fall, are rebuilt and crumble again, as religions wash through a region and mark them with symbols and efforts to honor the divine.   

The oceans and forests reflect the holy and we are hushed to awe as we corporately watch another sun set together silently along the beach.  Our children are leaving organized religion and reaching back to the pagan ways of worshiping in these natural places.

How do we notice what is drawing them, without judgement and instead listen.
How do we listen to the history of these places,
        and glimpse forward to where our children might lead?

May my work embrace the quiet, invite you to notice and still your soul.

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