Artist Statement: Dana Mattson

"Joy" is what I feel when I reflect on my association and collaboration with Terry for this show. Also "timelessness", a lifetime inside of a year, past and present overlapping. I thought often about my own childhood. I imagined Terry and myself as childhood friends making art together, everything seemed new and possible. Terry offered another artistic perspective and an opportunity for me to learn new skills.

My habits of thinking and seeing got a good shaking out. My previous style shifted to make room for a new experiment. What had been a looser abstraction in my work was now becoming detailed, even representational, as I worked alongside Terry. What had previously been printmaking was now a bow to printmaking turned painting, detailed paintings at that, using oil-based etching inks applied one layer after another. My color palette changed also, incorporating more of the colors of the Pacific Northwest.

A particular shape, recurring off and on over the last few years, found its home base in this body of work. The shape wanted to show up in every painting I did, whether subtle or overt. Later into our process I came across names for this shape - Vesica Pisces or Mandorla - being two names to describe the intersection of two overlapping spheres, the place where opposites enter each other and become both all and new.

This creative companionship with Terry was a wonderful experience for me, full of innocence and surprise. Opposites overlapping indeed, to illuminate and tend to each other and creation. Who could ask for more?

- Dana, 2011