In the late ’90’s during a professional artists’ workshop I began researching ways to expand my work, to push beyond the boundaries of my artistic  practice,  primarily painting, to come up with new ways of mark making. I challenged myself to do so with only the most basic materials…rice paper and glue. What emerged from this exploration were these beautiful paper collages –
little divisions of space, light and shadow.
Initially I hung them from the ceiling and referred to the work as ‘the path’.

However it wasn’t until 10 years later, when  Eric Cameron insisted that I find a way to include the piece for the ‘Sublime” exhibition that he was curating, that I discovered piano wire as a means of installing the collages. Only then did the full potential of the work begin to reveal itself.

Inspired by a note that my buddhist teacher and mentor, R. Gyō-zō Spickett, wrote after viewing the piece in my studio, I began to refer to the work as ‘hai’ lights  (hī-lites).