About me...
Formative
I have been making and loving art for as long as I can remember. I attribute my talent to my mother—who was once a floral designer and has a great eye.
From grocery store coloring contests to school competitions to making things for my own walls, I've always been driven to create.
I grew up in New York State in a small town near the banks of Lake Ontario. After studying art history and studio art at SUNY Fredonia, a liberal arts college in New York, I moved to Washington, D.C. to take a job with The American Institute for Conservation of Historic & Artistic Works (AIC). I was introduced to the world of art conservation and preservation during my time with AIC which deepened my passion for how art is created and maintained for generations to come.
Paris
In 1999, I moved to Paris where I taught part-time at the American University of Paris. I spent mornings teaching and the rest of my time living among the Parisians and exploring the city and the surrounding regions of France. If I could walk, Métro or use LGV, I went. Van Gogh's grave site, Montmartre, Sacré-Cœur, Versailles, Rodin's sculptures, the Centre Georges Pompidou, the École des Beaux-Arts -- my time in Paris had a profound impact on my life. When I returned to DC, I transitioned careers from art conservation and took a job with a DC-based technology consulting firm where I still work today.
Random-line drawing from my Paris sketchbook.
Today
I am fortunate to create from my home studio in metro DC. I balance my time between my full-time work as an organizational transformation and change strategist (I help people and orgs use data to drive and adapt to change) and creating as much art as I can.
Recently, I’ve been inspired to draw random line or stipple dot sketches and leave them as a token for my various AirBnB hosts. I try to create something related to the place where I’m staying. Here are a few of my favorites:
Work style, influences, and medium
I work with acrylic, oil, pen-in-ink and graphite with a bit of photography peppered in. My work is inspired by reflections of what's going on in my life, in nature, in politics, in the place I’m living at the time. From chronic kidney illness, to life on Lake Ontario, to living in DC, to my time in Paris – it’s both the positive and negative in life that inspire and transform my work.
One theme you'll see recurring in my work throughout the years is trees, specifically birch (or aspen) trees. I love them.
Creators who inspire me: Helen Frakenthaler, Marc Chagall, Chuck Close, Matt Sesow, Judy Chicago, Frida Khalo, Mark Cameron Boyd, Leah Frankel, Amy Tavern, Greg Gillis, Nancy Spero, Ashleigh Deskins, Alexander Calder, Louis Kahn, I.M. Pei, Georgia O'Keeffe, Eef Barzelay, Gord Downie, Charlie Mackesy.
“Whoever wants to know something about me – as an artist which alone is significant – they should look attentively at my pictures and there seek to recognize what I am and what I want.”