Nature has been my oldest companion. Growing up on an isolated farm in Illinois, the fields, flowers, and animals around me were my social world that shaped me. As a child I understood instinctively that this living, breathing landscape was something sacred, God in omnipresent form. That feeling never left me.
My work is rooted in that lifelong bond. Over decades, from the drought-resistant desert gardens I cultivated in the high desert outside Los Angeles, to the lush, rain-fed garden I tend today in Atlanta. I have followed nature wherever I’ve landed, and let it speak through my hands.
I work in mixed media and collage, building from layers of handmade paper created through Geli printing, then laying down color with paint markers, the soft blues, warm oranges, tender greens and yellows of spring. Paint is added in transparent, luminous layers until the piece finds its own breath. The process is intentional but never rigid. My only rule is that the work must flow naturally and feel true to me as I make it.
What I am chasing in each piece is that same quiet sense of connection I found as a curious child standing in an Illinois field. The feeling that the living world around us is generous, alive, and full of grace. I paint my garden. I paint what is felt in my soul.
