Artist Statement

The natural world, color, texture, and design is what moves me to create. My art hopefully challenges the viewer to feel, imagine, and daydream along with me, the artist. 

My artwork consists of four focal areas: landscape, floral, portrait, and abstract. My florals and landscapes fuse realism and fantasy, while my portraits wish to express something deep about the personalities, feelings, and/or social conditions of the people I choose to paint. My abstract work is generally composed of colorful repetitive patterns and shapes. 

I currently work in fabric collage, acrylic water-based media. My short list of favorite artists includes Raphael and Rembrandt, the Impressionists (especially Cezanne), the Fauves, Kandinsky and Klee.  Folk art is also inspirational. 

I've always been an artist!

However, since artists rarely earn enough money to support themselves, I eventually decided to pursue a college teaching career.  I earned a B.A. in English and history (but with far more credits in art).  After teaching English at Milwaukee School of Engineering and Milwaukee Area Technical College, I earned an M.A in linguistics at the University of Minnesota and spent a year at the university of Salamanca training teachers of English.  It was there that I began to learn Spanish and had the challenging experience of living in a foreign country. 

I returned to the U.S. and landed a variety of teaching jobs in Los Angeles, finally winning a position at Pasadena City College, where I spent more than 40 years teaching English and linguistics. During that time a earned a M.S in International Studies and a PhD in International Relations. I had a wonderful teaching career and loved working with students.

Following retirement, I was lost for a while. I gradually began to create art.  At first, it was ceramics, then acrylics, and finally mixed water media and watercolor.  Finally, I began to do paper collages for fun and gradually began to use fabrics to create “paintings.”  It was a transitional process.  Fabric collage is now basically what I do although I have recently returned to oil painting as well.    

I’m finally living the life of an artist!