Artist Statement

The need to create is not accidental. It feeds on an existential quest and reverberates in other areas of one's life. Direct carving has been my "ordinary habit" since 2008, in the words of Ann Cvetkovich, "a way to build the spiritual warrior self". 

It is a spiritual journey, a natural process that brings balance to my mind and body that I bear witness to in my own works. 

I love working to revive a piece of stone that was once used as a part of a stairway or an infrastructure support, discarded then put for sale in a second chance recycling store. I love that, if not for anything else, I make the point to use, reuse and recycle forms and ideas. Ideas of those who have preceded us.

In my work I feel deeply moved and influenced to tell my emotions and feelings about the state of human affairs and the importance of our collective memory.

I am a self-taught artist.

Research in the artistic dimension began for me in 2006 with wire, mixed assemblage, imitations in oil and ink of symbols and geometric signs, parietal engravings, petroglyphs, African masks, artifacts from Neolithic sites, indigenous art and zen series. My ink and oil paintings are mostly signed with my sinicized name 嘉德林. 

T. S. Eliott writes in his article Tradition and the individual talent that "the more perfect the artist, the more completely separate in him will be the man who suffers and the mind that creates; the more perfectly will the mind digest and transmute the passions that are its material." I can't say whether Eliott is correct. What I know is that I have not separated in me the person who suffers and the mind that creates.

Direct carving, to me, is like an incursion into another dimension between what is, what is not, and what will be, there is that fourth dimension,  the state of becoming, changing constantly.

The creative motion. 

Full Circle in art is about taking ownership of all what I have done since 2006 with drawing, painting, researching and carving. Everything comes to place for what comes next

I started with a mixed media class at the Arlington Art Center (AAC) in 2006, an introduction to stone carving with John Sonnier at the Corcoran College of Art in Washington, D.C., in 2008, and drawing and pottery classes in Alexandria, VA, and Shanghai. Upon my return to the States, I took stone carving classes with Kreshnik Xhiku and George Tkabladze at the Art League of Alexandria, as well as a metal sculpture class at with Donna Reinsel.

My works, mostly sculptural forms, heads, and figures, have been presented in over 40 in-person and online exhibits since 2007-2008. In parallel with my work as an artist, I research and write a multidisciplinary  Dialogue on the relationships between Consciousness and the Universe. 

I have taken a break the past few months searching for a path forward between my different life interests not wanting to let go of one at the expense of the other. If I owe to art that I feel more balanced and grounded. I owe to research and writing on the relationship between consciousness and the universe my sense of purpose for being and existing.

I am a Friend of The Healing Power of Art and Artists since 2023, a member of the National Association of Women Artists since 2022, and an associate member of the Allied Artists of America also since 2022.

Early on, I worked as a translator, in particular, of Buddhist scriptures (Huineng, Le Sûtra de la plate-forme. Paris: You Feng, 1992). Lived, studied, and worked in China (Zhang Chengzhi, Les rivières du Nord. Beijing: Collection Panda, 1992, Zong Pu, “Haricots rouges” and “Le sacrifice du cœur”. Littérature chinoise, vol.3, 1992, Liang Xiaosheng, “Père” in Une terre fabuleuse. Beijing: Collection Panda, 1991. Pp. 57-111, Su Ye, “Impérissables souvenirs du sud du Yangtsé”, “Un clair de lune sur le torrent Suo”, and “Ma chanson courte sur le banc de sable”. Littérature chinoise, Vol. 2, 1991). My translation from Chinese into French, Gao Yang, Le Dévouement du Marchand. Paris: You Feng, was published in 2008.