I’ve been drawing and painting abstractly since I was a child.  Mother encouraged it, as she took us to see great art at home and in the world, and provided entryways into reading, literature.  Movement also became integral to life – walking, running, and then dancing.  This movement eventually turned into yoga, bicycling, hiking, traveling, T’ai Chi.  Alongside movement, my art expression continued and changed.  I went to college and art school where I studied conceptual art, design, calligraphy, woodworking, drawing, painting.  Painting became the magical inventive world and focal point. I enjoyed facing the blank canvas or paper and being open to possibilities and transformations.   I drew the figure, painted still lifes in watercolors and oils, and then landscapes in oils.  I painted architecture and landscape together that mostly emphasized the natural world and elements, still lifes began to look like landscapes..  Then, the landscapes became abstract shapes, and then the surfaces became abstracted by ideas.  Now, I often start and feel my abstract work as landscapes extending off the picture plane. 

THE PAINTERLY JOURNEY 

After painting with watercolors, I started painting in oils on large canvases.  I enjoyed the consistency and interactions of the oils, the richness of the colors, the layering of thin to thick and light to dark paint. Eventually, working with oils became too toxic and I had to change my media and surface.  

I found that paper provided different textural possibilities, and influenced how and what I painted.  I also created more conceptual, minimalist, materials-oriented works such as thin cloth on stretchers or painted paper with subtracted cut-outs and/or added thread, paint. Eventually, I also found that I liked painting and drawing on hard wood surfaces.  Crucially, I discovered ground pigment paint. 

Ground pigments are interesting because they have strong, varying temperaments, as do oil paints. When mixing these ground pigments with a chosen medium, each blend creates a different response.  The pigment and and chosen medium can act more like watercolor or gouache or acrylic with different drying times, transparencies or opaqueness. 

My works investigate layering of and relationships between color, light, pattern, rhythm and are usually inspired by landscape, and often a story.  This story is not necessarily seen by the viewer:  It is a glue that creates the cohesion of the work, and hopefully leads the viewer into a visceral, emotional, sensing response, investigation, journey. 

OTHER LIFE JOURNEYS

I've worked at banks and law firms, been a first grade, algebra and science teacher, and elementary and middle school librarian.  I've volunteered at Berkeley Botanical Gardens, San Francisco Botanical Gardens, San Francisco Park & Recreation Open Space Advisory Committee, Pro-Arts, ArtSpan, San Francisco Art Institute Artists Committee, Developing Environments, Eastern Neighborhoods United Front, SFMTA NE Mission Advisory Committee. 
In 1999 I began learning T'ai Chi and continue practicing and teaching.