After working for a decade with non-traditional materials I have returned to painting with oils on stretched canvas. This switch led to a breakthrough--I developed a formal structure that seems (at least for now) to have unlimited possibilities. Inspired by the memory of place rather than landscape per se, and also by precursors (Joan Mitchell, Cy Twombly, Per Kirkeby), these large oil paintings allow me to marry gesture and drawing, giving equal weight to both, darkness and light, abstracted landscapes and emotional expressivity.