Heart of the Horse

Heart of the Horse – Exhibition Statement

Heart of the Horse is a deeply personal exhibition, tracing a creative and emotional journey shaped by the lives of the horses who have shared my world.  These works span years and media—from representational watercolor and bronze, to layered mixed media infused with memory, abstraction, and symbolism.  Each piece honors not just the form of the horse, but their presence—that mysterious shared connection between beings.

This collection reflects an evolution from early candid observation, to an evolving exploration of form and meaning, and finally to the intuitive and emotional terrain of memory and heart.  It is about what horses give us—companionship, vitality, imagination—and what remains when they’re gone.  Structured in four interrelated subgroups, Heart of the Horse invites viewers to follow this arc of relationship—from the seen and familiar, to the sensed and remembered.

Horses have been my companions, my studio muse, and my riding partners in both leisure and competition.  I stopped painting horses after the last of ours passed away three years ago.  My studio practice circled other subjects, but a quiet, horse‑shaped space remained.  Heart of the Horse is my return to that space—a body of work created in gratitude and remembrance for the equine companions whose presence, partnership, and personalities expanded my world.  This exhibition gathers memory, emotion, and material experimentation into a single conversation with them—and with you… 

What draws me back?  Horses emanate a magnificent energy—athletic, powerful, alert, and generous.    My attraction to them has always been visceral: the sweep of neck, the flick of an ear, warm breath in my ear.  They rekindle a childlike wonder—relationship before pretense, curiosity before judgment.  Their mystery and other‑worldliness are half spirit, half muscle, straddling the seen and the sensed.  Connecting with horses feels innocent and uncluttered—a pure, subsurface current beneath words.  They inhabit the stuff of dreams, yet they ground us: standing quietly beside a horse can steady a racing mind.  These impulses form the emotional armature for this exhibition.

Whether you come to these works with your own horse stories or simple curiosity, I invite you to move slowly.  Notice shifts in scale, surface, and symbolism across the subgroups.  Let memory rise.  Stand close, then step back—just as one might approach a horse.  May they share their hearts with you just as they gave to me.

The exhibit unfolds across four distinct but interwoven subgroups that reflect both a chronological progression and a broadening of artistic exploration—from traditional observation to symbolic memory, from candid gestures to abstracted emotion.  These groupings honor the evolving ways horses have appeared in my life and work.

Dream Horses

The most recent work in this exhibition, the Dream Horses are intimate mixed-media pieces that arise from memory, intuition, and symbolic association. They reflect my return to the horse as subject after a period of grief and creative distance. These works are less about physical likeness and more about emotional resonance—flickers of presence, power, and joy.  The processes used in creating these jewels were very playful, reflecting the joy horses spark in my spirit, and range from pulling images from randomly colored or abstracted backgrounds, to mixed media collage.

Heart Horses

Painted in tandem with the Dream Horses, the Heart Horses are larger, more grounded mixed-media pieces rooted in specific memories of my own horses. These works carry the emotional weight of lived experience—awe, exuberance, devotion, grief and companionship.  They are rendered realistically using some of my favorite techniques—including drips, splatters, collage, and textured gels.

Mind’s Eye

The Mind’s Eye subgroup of primarily watercolors shares investigations into how we “see” horses internally and translate that perception into expressions on paper.  Expect shifts from flat shape to calligraphic line to modeled volume; from subjective, expressive color to monochromatic tonal pieces; these paintings represent the leap from depicting a specific subject realistically, to capturing ideas and feelings surrounding the subjects. 

Candid Moments

This subgroup of bronze sculptures and representational watercolors gathers the most observational works in the exhibition.  The bronze equine sculptures capture unguarded poses, joined by a selection of representational watercolor paintings—the medium in which I first explored horses in thematic series.  The candid gestures of these pieces capture the everyday language of partnership—on the trail, in the paddock, at the gate.  They remind me that before symbolism, before memory transforms, there is simple companionship in shared time and space.