I guess I love to paint because I can be as inventive as I choose. For example, I recently painted a woman whose face and dress are made up entirely from a crochet design. She's sitting in a chair reading a book, "Best Crochet Bars in New York." She's wearing a large purple hat with a big multi-colored feather sweeping around it. New York skyscrapers are seen through the balcony behind her. A cardinal on the wall also is "crocheted." It was about the most fun of any painting I've done.
I began painting about 12 years ago. After attending Missouri University where I studied Liberal Arts I kept finding myself drawn to studying different art media.I studied the impressionists and modern art, as well as diffent types of realism.I started doing oil paintings. I did them more by imagination than being influenced by other artists. Then I learned how to put shapes, designs and patterns together to form full compositions.
I found I liked bold and unusual colors, appealing subjects and free reign of my imagination. There were some artists whose use of color and techniques have helped me create my own style and use of color. I liked the way A.A.Gockel combined parts of human figures with abstraction and the way Francis Picabia could compose figures in an abstract way, and Gustav Klimt's use of detailed background behind an equally complex figure to make it appear that they run into each other when they really don't. I mix the impressionist style with wildlife and use expressive colors because I feel they produce the most striking effect.
I like Salvador Dali's use of wild figures to represent interesting ideas, particularly his dreamscapes. I invented my own dreamscape in one of my paintings about a woman and a lot of preparations she has to make to get ready for her day. I call it, "America the Blondiful from Sea to Shining Hair."
My approach to art has been uncoventional from the beginning. I decided that rather than confining my work to one medium I would work in oil, watercolor and acrylic, and, similarly, would not be limited to one medium but would do modern, wildlife and fantasy. I found there is nothing more satisfying than learning new techniques and using my imagination to create new approaches and develop new ways of using color and light. There's also a synergy when you move from one medium to another. When you learn how to do modern, it helps with wildlife, which in turn brings new ideas to my fantasy works.
Early on I made another unconventional decision. I would only sell art prints of my paintings, which range in size from 16" x 20" to 30" x 40." The idea being that in this way I could eventually assemble a large and varied portfolio of prints --- something I obviously couldn't do if I sold my paintings. In late 1999, after creating a sufficient number of varied paintings in my three chosen fields, I began marketing my Giclee prints. I make sure my prints faithfully reproduce the originals' smallest details, warmth of colors and the appeal of my subjects.
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