statement

My architecturally based work focuses on cycles of manmade construction and natural decay. In the "Empire" series, thoughts of empires past, present, and future guide my choices in creating a visual language of colossal forms which are simultaneously coming into and fading from existence. In these drawings and paintings, I explore an improvisational approach to building images of invented monumental architecture paralleling the approach in my previous entangled organic drawings. This process often continues to a point where the image erodes leaving only vestiges of the initial form.

In the "Ebb and Flow" series, the architectural forms are piled on top of each other in multiple layers. Instead of one monumental form, the drawings grow like impossible cities – both living and dying, expanding and erasing forms.  The contemplation of the simultaneous natural construction and destruction of manmade structures stems from my experience living for two years in Turkey, a country which I still return to and explore every other summer. In Turkey there is a wealth of ruin and renewal. Anatolia has seen numerous civilizations wash across its soil – from the Etruscans, Hittites and Greeks, to the Romans, Byzantines, and Ottomans. Each laid down its foundations upon the previous. Each left evidence of past hopes, beauty, and grandeur. Today the dense and layered landscape that remains reveals this epic ebb and flow of construction and devastation.  And today's inhabitants lay down future remnants as they pass across the land.

bio

born: 1968, Eau Claire, Wisconsin

education

University of Iowa, MFA, 1996
Columbia College, BFA , 1990

selected awards/honors

Wyoming Arts Council Visual Arts Fellowship, 2008

selected publications
International Drawing Annual (iNDA) 4, Manifest Creative Research Gallery and Drawing Center, Cincinnati, OH, p. 142-143, 2008
International Drawing Annual (iNDA) 2007, Manifest Creative Research Gallery and Drawing Center, Cincinnati, OH, p. 110-113, 2007

selected solo or two-person exhibits

Doug Russell, Leedy Voulkos Art Center, Kansas City, MO, 2013
Confluences, Missoula Art Museum, Missoula, MT, 2012
Entangled Worlds, Hartmann Art Gallery, Bradley University, Peoria, IL, 2012
Entangled Worlds, The Urban Institute for Contemporary Arts, Grand Rapids, MI, 2009

selected group shows

The Architecture of an Idea, Alden B. Dow Museum of Science and Art, Midland, MI, 2013
M(i)(A)cro: A Contemporary Drawing Exhibition, New Art Center, Newton, MA, 2012
Evidence and Residues: An Investigation of Contemporary Drawing, University Art Gallery, Indiana State University, Terra Haute, IN, 2007
Drawing No Conclusions, Urban Institute for Contemporary Arts, Grand Rapids, MI, 2007