While I am enamored with the direct act of sculpting the sensual forms of the human figure, I confront a challenge presented by figurative sculpture – namely, having something to say about humans and their condition. I do not have a predetermined theme or even knowledge of what will draw me in until I am. I have found myself immersed in portraits of the elderly to capture their dignity as well as complex states of mind. While in the hospital after cancer surgery I became taken with the idea of sculpting a newborn donkey still partially wrapped in its afterbirth sac, probably as a way to usher in my own recovery and renewal. Currently I am working on a sculpture based on a photograph of an Armenian woman and children on a forced march. The photograph which compelled me by its composition and triggered in me memories of stories told by female relatives who survived such a march during the Armenian Genocide.