April 30 – June 9, 2021
1600 Liberty St.
Haw/Contemporary, Kansas City, MO – Stockyards District
My work emerges from specific places—places I’ve developed a relationship with over time. There’s something alluring, something that brings me back again and again to the Kansas River, or Kaw, and its 173 miles of ceaseless transformation. I’m drawn into the river’s current and ancient coursing—this ongoing adventure of water and sand and weather over time, which is always different now than it was the minute before.
Some reaches are bound geologically and remain fairly stable over centuries while others have shifted dramatically in the brief time I’ve been watching them. Science can explain much about the river and flow dynamics, the myriad unseen organisms and everything that makes a river a living system. My observations are not scientific in the classical sense, but like a scientist I’m drawn to patterns and observe and record changes. They’re everywhere, from the ripples my kayak makes slicing through the water, and the ones the winds make, to the crazy sand shapes I discover walking along the edges of a sandbar as morning fog lifts.
Over the years I’ve taken a dozen or so flights in a small plane up and down the Kaw for painting reference. Revisiting the river from an aerial perspective has allowed me to witness incredible changes from season to season and year to year. At river mile 47, forty-seven miles upstream from Kansas City, the Mud Creek tributary cuts in from the northwest and the river takes a sharply angled turn that’s distinctly different from the others in this mostly sinuous river. Through a variety of encounters, this section of the river has quietly pressed itself into my awareness over the years. It’s a nice view when you reach “Land’s End” on the mountain bike trails that begin in North Lawrence. That was my first introduction even before I moved to Lawrence in 1996. I didn’t know that I was looking across the river at an island—didn’t know anything about the river then. But I now consider it my backyard, just 4 miles northeast from my home as the crow flies.
As I’ve studied, photographed, paddled, and painted the entirety of the river, this unique angular bend with its island holds up as the most interesting spot on the Kaw for me. I’ve experienced dramatic changes in this area and through the process of studying maps and my photographs, and painting from them, and consulting with colleagues, I’ve better understood the transformation that has occurred here. Using a series of images on the small panels allowed me to recreate a sense of circling this spot from above, over the years, from a variety of vantage points and seasons.
The first time I launched my kayak was from a ramp on Mud Creek. Then, around 2005, the main channel was on the north side of the island. Heavy in-river dredging was happening upstream on the south side of the river. With each flooding event, erosion gradually drew more current into the south channel as the north side began to silt in. The ramp at Mud Creek was closed because it has no reliable water and it’s now the domain of beaver and kingfishers. Recently, after seven months of flooding in 2019, the river cut a new channel through the island, and it seems likely to become the main one. At higher water levels you can now paddle through the three different channels. My “River Mile 47” project represents a painted representation of the evolution of this location from 2003 to February 2021.
The images from 2019 to the present were created from my drone footage, and, thankfully, having the drone has allowed me to continue collecting aerial imagery when I haven’t been able to fly due to the pandemic. It doesn’t replace the higher altitude perspective but has provided a heron’s eye view as opposed to the eagle’s. I can cruise over the sandbars and revel in their patterns and shapes.
There’s nothing like painting to really see and develop affection for places, and, for me, it is a way to honor the river, one painting at a time. Every day I drink the Kaw from the tap along with 800,000 other Kansans. Paddling and exploring sandbars is one of my favorite things to do. How can I possibly reciprocate? Every painting is an attempt to give something back––to share my affection for this river and put it on the map. I see my role as bringing these places into the consciousness of the community and hopefully fostering a deeper appreciation of their beauty and importance.