It was after moving to Kings Mountain that I started making assemblages. Kings Mountain sits between Half Moon Bay and Woodside in the northern Santa Cruz range - a buffer zone between Silicon Valley's concentrated activity and the empty expanse of the Pacific. I have hiked these mountains, taking in breathtaking vistas, seen the forested canyons and surprised by the sudden fog rolling in. During these hikes I saw many pictures chronicling the endless cycle of birth, death and rebirth.

The Peninsula landscape is a powerful stimulant. But it's not nature alone that compels me - it's we humans leaving our marks in nature. I take my inspiration from that juxtaposition.

A fallen leaf, a rusty rebar, a crack in the asphalt of a parking lot - these trigger the initial image. I develop ideas through rough sketches, then build the assemblage on wood panel.

Using found objects, I transform the ordinary into an object of attention. As the ordinary transcends the commonplace, it becomes a metaphor for how we transcend our ordinary existence.

I don't assign meaning to my pieces. Their significance is relative to the viewer. The absence of a title forces the observer to engage the work itself - there is no bias, only what they bring to it.

Some pieces do carry personal relevance. This one is the result of experiencing a thunderstorm in the Montana mountains at night - the rumbles, rolls, claps and cracks of thunder, the magnificent flashes of lightning hitting the earth. Impossible to describe with words. This piece captures such a night.