Artwork / 2006 / Lois

Lois’ portrait is stretched on a frame I made myself. In fact, it was the first stretcher I had made in years. I learned from James Thompson how to build them when I was in school, but, as I began to paint for a living in 2003, my father took on the task of building my stretchers.

It was only in 2006 that I relieved him of this duty, because I decided that I wanted to be more flexible about the sizes of my paintings. I am still grateful for the years of technical work that my father put into my paintings, just as I’m grateful for the bag-sewing my mother has done.