Artist’s Statement
While I have been living in the Northwest for a long time, my
childhood memories provide the inspiration for my drawing and
painting. My work addresses the nature of memory and experience
and how it shapes our sense of self. I depict imagery that
reveals a child’s point of view that can touch upon imagined
fears, ambivalence or body awareness. Familiar objects, ordinary
plants and other forms enter my work as do imagined phantom
beings. These can be deeply symbolic metaphors or casual props,
often paired together for paradoxical and formal contrasts.
There is something about the honesty of childhood emotions that I
am so drawn to, how it imprints itself on the depth of our being.
It’s the recognition of this emotional experience I try to elicit
in my work.
PAT DE CARO
April 2010
