In the early days of the Covid pandemic, I felt afraid and overwhelmed. We were all connected to someone who had gotten very ill or died. We learned to stay inside, covering our faces and bleaching anything that came into our bubbles.

I started a new work that was my personal ark. It was my answer to the question, “If you were stranded on a desert island, who would you want to be stranded with?”. I created a field of waves, a flat space with no horizon. Placed within the turbulence were 84 bodies - people I knew, people I admired, people I felt were important to civilization. They swam away from the viewer, all moving towards something… not sure what. My favorite writers, artists, thinkers, family and friends all in the same boat, all afloat.

As vaccines rolled out and restrictions eased, we learned how to come together again in physical space. In the United States, we put precautions behind us, and even started to reconsider our alarm. Data about the positive ecological impacts of a world on lockdown began to be released. Clear skies, cleaner waters, and a distinct reduction in waste.

The painting hanging on my wall began to feel very crowded and I began the task of removing every single person. I was no longer stranded, and I wanted to see those waters.

What is left is a seascape with no horizon, deep but not infinite. Ultimately the person viewing this work is left alone; yes - viewing turbulence - but turbulence colored in clean emeralds and ochres that are smoothing and soothing. And really, are the seas rough if we are not in them?

The title of this piece is inspired by a film by Stanely Kubrick, “Dr. Strangelove, or How I Learned to Love the Bomb. It was told to me that Kubrick had set out, at first, to tell a serious story about the insanity of the Cold War and the mutually assured destruction (MAD) measures implemented by the USSR and USA. The more he learned and uncovered, the more impossible it was to tell a dramatic story about MAD. Kubrick began reshaping the story into an absurd black comedy, because the actuality was too insane.