watercolor and colored pencil on paper.
10" x 8" unframed
16" x 13" framed.
 
Scientifically speaking, a perturbation is a deviation of a system caused by an outside influence. (I copied that definition.) In painting this, I was originally thinking disturbances in climate systems, now irreparable in our lifetimes and for generations to come. These systems are trying desperately to find balance, as they always have, but in the process of doing do, are causing an imbalance fluctuating between minor disruption and major disaster, with unusual patterns more frequent and wavelengths further apart from the mean. In this piece, what seems to be a balance between hot and cold, upon closer look, is not balanced at all. The distribution of heat and cooling is at times inverted, as well as being infiltrated in odd ways. Perturbation also means a state of agitation. I once thought there was an equilibrium in human events, i.e. an equal amount of things seemed to get better and/or worse over any period of time. Climate change has disrupted that. And quite honestly, the cascading series of recent political events also decimates my earlier theory. It feels as though we have already entered a severely chaotic epoch. As someone who is marginalized about four different ways, as well being highly sensitive, I am deeply steeped in anxiety right now, and at the best moments, this mental uneasiness is constantly humming away in the background. But I keep creating. I am a lifelong exhibiting artist and a late-diagnosed Autistic person. Although oil painting is my primary medium, during the pandemic I took up an active watercolor practice. My work fluctuates between abstraction and magical realism, depending on what it is I need to express in a particular piece at a particular time.