Location: United States
We all need BEAUTY in this world, to remind us of what's most important — our humanity, and the higher expressions of our heart. I feel most passionate about inspiring the elevation of the human condition, through energetic abstract expressions of spirited emotions.
While so much of modern existence seems routinely depressed and stressed, I am moved to construct magical and meaningful fantasies that inspire deeper connections to pure joy. Varying degrees of surreal ambiguity leaves the viewers' imagination to create further inpretations.
A driving theme of my oil paintings is transformational adventures through dark times to personal triumph.
I feel it's my role as an artist to create dynamic art that reflects a personal interaction with the world and fills the spirit with a celebration of life.
Passion and power dance freely in dramatic juxtapositions. A vivid cantata of contrasting colors vibrate, explode apart and swoon together. Often a deliverance emerges from the drama, a soulful vision of transcendence appearing in glowing light and sensual, organic curves.
“Can't Stop The Beat Of A Wild Heart”
You just can’t make too many demands of a wild heart; it will follow it’s own rhythm to the ends of the earth. This painting is completely abstract and spontaneous in it’s origin, inspired heavily by the nonobjective art of Kandinsky, Franz Marc, and a host of Expressionist painters. Still as I explored this painting further, the image of a human heart appeared to be throbbing there on the canvas, with the sharp triangular points appearing at the sides to stab it, and long strips of ribbons trying to cover and contain it.
The analogy whispers to me that a very passionately creative free spirit (such as myself, of course) is not as receptive in dealing with the demands of a traditional society, with it’s overrule of practicality and constrictions. You can’t stop wild horses, and if you do, you’ve killed a very beautiful spirit of nature.
Best to let the wild hearts run free, so that they can share the beauty and insight that helps uplift the world.
Inside the Revelry Divine is an abstract representational expression about divine soulmate love. Others may see different pictures when they look at this piece, but to me it represents the union of like minds, true hearts, and passionate sexual connections. A pair of soulmates create dynamic spherical movements with their lovemaking, and an abundance of joyful light and energy overflows out past their cocoon into the lush natural surroundings that cradles the sensual theme.
Byron Bird Orchestration is an abstract expression that can be considered a synesthestic painting, where one can “hear” color, or “see” music. Here the magical music of natural wildlife is captured. In Byron Bay, Australia my husband and I sat and listened to the most amazing sounds in a forest by the beach. We couldn’t see any animals, but every moment was filled with layers of many kinds of birds, insects, a native “cuckaburrow”, and a mysterious low-pitched humming vibration. We both sketched the sounds together, letting our pencils echo the unique sounds we heard as they happened. Then I elaborated it into a detailed drawing and lastly this painting.
“Upwards Through The Brambles”
“Upwards Through The Brambles” delves into the human and philosophical experience as we often struggle for fulfillment in our lives. The transformational journey through dark times towards personal triumph is expressed through dynamic forms and intense saturated colors.
When I sat down to make this painting, I was definitely feeling the suffering of many ordeals. Do you ever feel like you often struggle through obstacles, only to be met by more of them?
Well, I feel that if you stay determined and passionate about making your life better, you can climb upwards through all those thornbushes that block your way, towards the heavenly light of a better reality.
I’m particularly interested in abstracted form that has a basis in reality, and it’s that ambiguity which I love to explore. At first glance this painting may look completely non-representational, but actually it’s based off the architecture of Frank Gehry’s Walt Disney concert hall. At first glance of that building, I was captivated by the highly organic style of his design, where all normal building notions were completely reinvented by what looked to me like giant sheets of musical scores, tossed up joyously into the air. Inspiration struck a chord in me, and I was compelled to honor this masterpiece in a composition of my own.
The physical scale of this painting in person envelopes one right into the middle of these large shapes. The dramatic curves dance and swoon upwards toward the night sky, and the warm colors in the center hint at the mysterious life going on inside the building. In person the appearance of the building changes from every angle, and so I aimed to incorporate these multi-facets into my own interpreted view of it.
What do you see when you look at this painting? Do you see light energy in motion, and/or do you see the abstracted figure?
The ambiguity of form is intentional here, representing how powerful forces in our lives may be felt energetically more than seen. This fierce red figure represents the inner warrior in each of us, intently fighting his way through the darkness around him, kicking and punching out walls of a cave, ever reaching towards the light.
The initial inspiration came from a photograph of a young boy doing a karate kick, and to abstract it completely I was compelled to incorporate my growing Cubist and Futurist tendencies, which adds an extra dimension of energetics and space through time.
SOLD. Prints Available.
Leap Of Faith is a surrealistic expression that was inspired by something which we’re all afraid to do at some point in our lives: take a leap of faith. Sometimes you feel compelled to take a big step along your life’s path that from a social perspective may appear to run against rational logic and other’s advice. Going against the norm or making a huge shift is a scarily independent place to be, yet when you feel this choice so passionately in your heart, mind and soul, you have to take the risk to make the move, no matter what the consequences will be.
Who doesn’t want more peace in their life?
Unfortunately, this world isn’t perfect yet, and there’s still a lot of pain in everyone’s lives, whether you’re affected by war or by personal suffering. I created this peace-keeping angel to help inspire us all in dark times. She is gracefully sweeping away all the pain and blackness, and spreading a big arc of light and love. May it uplift you to do the same!
“The Path Between City and Country”
Perhaps many people who’ve grown up in the suburbs, as I have, can appreciate the fascinating call of a big city. The opportunities of the city drew me in early in life, yet after living there for a few years, the gentle beauty of more natural surroundings pulled me in the opposite direction. Now my path has lead me back to a more rural version of the suburbs in Los Angeles, in a satisfying place in between city and country. This painting illustrates alot of the frustration I began to feel living in the city, where it felt dark, cramped and chaotic. Framed with stormy clouds, and lined with an entangled mess of highways that metaphorically seem to be going nowhere, the artificial entrapment of the city exudes darkness, and even hints at death with the shadow of gravestones. Leading away from the city, a pair of figures follows the “yellow brick road” to a brightly lit doorway summit overlooking a completely different scenario. The arch of a rainbow welcomes them into the lush green vibrancy of nature, with its abundant sunshine, trees and waterfalls. With this painting I pay homage to early Expressionism and Kandinsky’s vision of Moscow, in the way his bold colors and abstracted subjects communicate passion for the feeling of places.
Spring Symphonia is an abstract respresentational expression inspired by the first bouquet of spring flowers from my garden. Lush vibrant petals of irises, roses, and various wildflowers burst forth with dynamic shape and movements that herald the fresh vitality of a growing garden on a colorful spring day.
Ascension is an abstract expression inspired by the irrepressIble spirit of joy. The constrictive black bars are a metaphor for the circumstances or institutions that try to imprison our creative nature, and the peaked texture of red wounds are a reminder of the painful struggles that we’ve faced and overcome. Throughout all these obstacles, the blue flame of the spirit pushes through and grows stronger because of them, ever reaching towards greater heights of light, peace, and self-actualization.
(Ascension is unique in that its peaks of texture near the center are quite raised, up to a half inch or more above the surface of the canvas. This is to accentuate the turmoil and the power of where the “wounds” and the spirit meet.)
painting was originally inspired by anger at a situation that was exasperating but out of my control to fix. The day felt dark and stormy, and my resentment at the situation had been brewing for a while, like a storm building speed. There was a really argumentative rationale that I wanted to make to these “storm-makers”, which were some very good “points” in my favor. But afterwards I realized it was more important to stay strong and silent because I wanted to preserve a good relationship for the future, so I thought “What’s the Point?”
“Inside The Revelry Divine”
“Byron Bird Orchestration”
“Rapture in Lyrical Blue”
“Light Warrior”
“Leap Of Faith”
“Lighting The Dark”
“Spring Symphonia”
“Ascension”
“What’s the Point?”
