My artwork is a reflection of a life in motion.  The gates open.  Horses gallop tightly in a pack; they bump and jostle.  Jockeys keep an eye on the track ahead and on the horses that are gaining ground.  In my equestrian paintings I try to capture the special relationship between the rider and the horse.  My mother bred and trained thoroughbred horses.  From a relatively early age I became interested in the process of breaking in horses, getting them ready for a life with bits and saddles and riders.  When I hit an impasse, I put myself atop the horse, eyes closed, until I can feel it in my gut.

 

I became a painter after working in the world of fashion and as a costume designer in the movie industry.  I became a painter not to escape but to settle on what I had been moving towards.  There was no grand plan, but it all makes sense in hindsight.

 

I had good teachers along the way who taught me about color, texture, and composition, and about story-telling and the cut and splice.  Art is now my profession, and I approach it with the same dedication that I did my previous full-time jobs. 

 

The nitty-gritty.  I start with an image, and let it sit.  I look at it every which way.  I ask myself:  why?  Why put it down on canvas?  Why stare it?  Why not just let it be?  I see paintings as an invitation, a reaching out to someone not yet there.  Success:  they are moved enough to try to read between the lines, or just to re-internalize it, and let it sit.  The poet may try to pat and ply it and turn it into words. 
 

I paint in order to share, to open a circle, and hope that it multiplies.

 

My studio is a mess.  And why not, I am attracted to unruly images; the sort that will not fit squarely into four corners and two-dimensions.  I try to memorize that special moment right before something really meaningful happens.  Horses in mid-air about to land and continue to the next steeple, or seconds before the starting gate bolts open.

 

I tend to settle on images full of movement and suspense.  Chaos and anticipation: behind the scenes in fashion shows, where faces and bodies get transformed, packaged and repackaged and sent to the end of the runway and back.  I am attracted to that moment right before the shower curtain gets pulled back and the whole theater goes deathly silent. 

 

“In the silence the wind grows/with its single leaf and its battered flower….”     Neruda