Jennifer — Millville Road
Medium: Chalk Pastel on Paper
Date: c. 2007
A chalk pastel drawing of a young woman (Jennifer) sitting on a broken swing in tall grass at dusk, rendered on black paper so that shadow precedes light. The figure turns slightly away from the viewer, her face framed by the last light of the day.
The grass behind her reads almost like ocean waves, atmosphere built through contrast and movement rather than literal detail. The image holds both stillness and tension, as if something is shifting within (and just beyond) the frame.
Process Notes:
The reference photograph for this drawing was taken around 1999–2000 on one of the first rolls of 35mm film I ever shot after borrowing a Nikon F4 from my high school art teacher. The location — a row of long-abandoned houses in Millville, West Virginia — carries personal history. My grandfather once lived in those houses, and they remain part of the landscape of my life.
The drawing was made roughly eight years later during a period of technical exploration with hard pastels on black paper. Like other works from this time, it began as an exercise in constructing light from darkness.
The figure is Jennifer, my lifelong friend and frequent photographic subject. For decades she has appeared in my work, across mediums. In this image, she is both herself and a surface onto which atmosphere and the lens of its witness settle.
Looking back, the piece marks an early recognition that what I was capturing was not only the scene in front of me, but the interior weather I was carrying at the time and a searching presence I still very much recognize within. The grass has always felt oceanic to me, like a visual echo of the way anxiety can move in waves. Yet the light remains.
The original drawing hangs in my home library.
