In the meditative process of making ink by hand from black walnut husks, I become intimate with my pigments far before they reach paper. The process of separating, boiling, filtering, and purifying my ink is a practice of mindfulness in action. Tapping into the expansiveness of the universe through one particular element I find meaning in a penumbral space. I believe the organic medium with which work is created is tantamount to its representational ability to serve as a vehicle for literal or metaphorical meaning.