"If you need a place to go, take any road.™"

I am a Philadelphia painter working primarily with oil on canvas.

I think we all see the world a little differently and feel our own experience uniquely.  I paint using what all of my senses have given to me as the experience.  When I paint the sky, I am feeling the wind, putting it to music in my head, remembering the smell of the chance of rain, tasting the air, seeing the clouds dance.  Some skies reveal the swirl of life’s emotions that can be found in the movement of the clouds, ranging from fear to hope, foreboding to resolve, trepidation to acceptance…a sky that is still and silent but portending a change that will send it racing with a ferocity toward you as it begs you watch, stop, and not be afraid.  Take any road encourages the viewer to have the confidence to experience life no matter how difficult or confusing.

I paint emotions and stories, often blooming in bursts and dashes of color.  My landscapes are built up of layers into rhythmic cadences and dissonance, complexity and suggestion, through a painterly surface tension that resolves into a lyrical narrative.  Poetry, not prose.  I use loose and free brush marks in my work to show the dramatic light and energy that both represent and define the tension and optimism of life.  I infuse my feelings of joy, playfulness, empathy, and hope into the story, a composition that responds to the mood and tempo of a place.  My paintings are purposely not detailed, leaving the viewer to feel enough to complete the images based on his or her own sense of belonging.

The longing to see loved ones and remember the people I have lost causes me to dwell in places real and imaginary – Canada, Scotland,  Philadelphia, New Mexico, or Brigadoon.  My paintings are carpe diem.  They emphasize the brevity of life, an experience that is drawn and redrawn.  One should be somewhere, whether in memory or desire, and live each moment to the fullest. 

ARTIST STATEMENT

Early in my career, around 1970. I was drawn to painting ice flows as a reaction to the looming prospect of an ice age to come. Each brushstroke was a testament to the bare beauty and inevitable change of our natural world. However, recent experiences have profoundly shifted my artistic focus.

Last year, while hiking through the Canadian Rockies, I encountered the majestic glaciers firsthand. This journey took on deeper significance as it marked a personal triumph over adversity. Having survived my third battle with breast cancer and a near-death reaction to immunotherapy, each step felt like a victory. Hiking seven miles amidst the breathtaking glaciers became a poignant reminder of resilience and the preciousness of life.

Through my recent series of paintings, I dwell on the delicate balance between the fragility and treacherousness in our environment, particularly the melting glaciers. These impressive formations, once symbols of permanence, now embody the urgent narrative of climate change and human impact.

I use a palette that echoes the underlying dark millennial-ice blues; the still-ice blues of ice turning into water; and the greys ash of moraine, the falling deposits of glacial till. Each brushstroke conveys the emotional weight of these dangerously delicate arrangements of movement that invites viewers to understand, rise up, swell fully, and preserve our planet.

My art is not just a reflection of personal triumphs and awareness of metaphors in nature; it is a call to some kind of point of view and awareness. By exploring the intersection of nature's beauty and human resilience, I hope to spark conversations and inspire meaningful discussion in how we perceive and protect our natural world.

There is a fury behind the peace of it all. You can see it in the direction of my strokes.