I was in a very difficult painting place the entire year of 2001. NOTHING was working. As an abstract painter, I couldn't bring myself to paint something as specific as a tree, although I had been photographing them for ten years as reference material.

Two years ago, I had taken a photo of a tree trunk with a radically twisting limb that had survived the fierce winds from the Hudson River in lower Manhattan. Behind this tree, arose the Twin Towers. I felt annoyed by their presence, since I wanted an uncluttered image of the tree. I shot the picture and forgot about it.

Two months after 9/11, still numb from witnessing the event just five blocks from my home, I tried to paint again. Not knowing how to begin, I projected slides on a half-finished painting. Suddenly the World Trade Center and that intrepid tree appeared. Overwhelmed with grief and shame that I had been annoyed by the towers, I decided to complete the painting by showing the tree still standing. In place of the World Trade Center was a smear of red-orange paint. After finishing this work, images for new paintings suddenly poured out of me and a painting block that I had been grappling with for most of the year was gone.