Capturing the Sun and Chasing the Moon is a research project conducted during a year long research leave from teaching in 2012.  The project was made possible with the support of the North Carolina Arts Council and the partnering arts councils of the Central Piedmont Regional Artists Hub Program, and grants from The Banff Center, The University of North Carolina at Greensboro's International Programs, College of Arts and Sciences Advancement Council, and the Art Department.


The title of the project is intended to evoke images and references from Creation Mythologies along with absurd notions of capturing the sun with nets or traps while chasing the moon around the earth.  The timeless fascination with time, light, and being is universal and my interest the primal and elemental directed my curiosity to attempt to experience and to represent the extremes of light and darkness found on or near the Arctic Circle.  The midnight sun and the polar night define this circle as it marks where one can witness an day when the sun never sets and 6 months later a day when it never rises.


I traveled to 3 residencies, Gullkistan in Laugavartn Iceland in June/July, Herhusid in Siglifjordur Iceland in November, and the Banff Center in Banff, Alberta Canada in December. During each residency, I dedicated myself to contemplate and study time as it revealed by light and the extremes of light.  My project is primarily a video and photographic study but also inspired a series of drawing, collages, sound and related work that I have titled the Creation Elements.