The Painters Palette: Alchemy and the Act of Painting is a group of fourteen paintings completed during 2009-2010 using the base material or primal substance of oil paint to create imaginary abstract environments in the manner of the early alchemists, whose objective was to transform base metals into gold and, more metaphorically, to transform spiritual elements into new and higher states of mind. My paintings aim at forming unique visual images that are the result of the process of interacting physically with the material of oil paint. The canvas is seen as an arena in which to act-an event rather than a "picture." Light and dark colors are used to model forms. Imaginary spaces emerge as the forms are overlapped, buried, and retrieved. The formal elements of shape, line, light, and color give way to an ecstatic emotional experience, an event captured on canvas, a transformation.