Painting is not distinct from everyday life, but is a way of connecting directly with that life. As the language I speak best in, painting is my way of articulating, and sharing, the experience of living. The people, places and things I encounter on a daily basis are the inspiration for my work; the experience of being in a given place at a given time, of paying attention to momentary nuances and changes – now the sun shifts, the wind rises and shadows lengthen, colors deepen – is at the heart of what I do and why I do it. Life requires participation, a willingness to see and be affected. And painting can open us to seeing what is there, or even, more than we think is there: the extraordinary beauty of the perfectly ordinary.

The interplay of immediacy and fluidity in perception and response in the world around us also holds true for how I hope my work is seen. I am a perceptual artist, taking in the world as it presents and unfolds itself. Rather than tell you what I “intended” or think I “captured”, I hope we meet in the moment. My work is what you see, experience and feel now, as you stand with it, just as it is also imbued by what I saw, felt and experienced as I painted.

Painting  “en plein air” in “one-take” sessions, my style is gestural – quick and loose, ceding control and letting go, not privileging things as they are supposed to be, but as they happen. For years, I was immersed in the simplicity of black and white, making hundreds of charcoal drawings learning the richness of light and dark. At present, I am working in oils, trying to learn and express individual color vibrations, how colors relate and interact and their affective potential, alone and in juxtaposition. In addition to the complexities of color, texture and material, my style is evolving in response to the challenge of painting in the midst of others, in the heart and on the streets of the city. Seeing and being seen are now intertwined: the isolated artist becomes a public spectacle, and must attempt to stay present, true to the experience and all that it holds.