Q: What inspires you? Where do you get your ideas? A: Miracles of natural design absolutely thrill and astonish me every day… the complexity of a flower, a broken seashell, a bird’s wing… they fill my days and dreams with work and inspiration, and have given me more ideas than I could ever possibly get to. They move me to work at art, and I aspire to their kind of beauty as I work. Q: How would you describe your work? A: Considering ‘official’ [established] categories I have difficulty finding just the right slot, but since I do need to have a name for it so I can ~talk~ about it (wouldn’t I love to think… my art speaks for itself!) maybe sensual art fits these works best. They are meant to please your senses… to quicken your heart… to set you dreaming… Combining miracles of natural design with elements of the more human world in sort of intimate ways I wish I could see pleases me as I work on my own designs… that kind of sensual fantasy, dreamy, somewhat surreal idea has never been an intentional ‘theme’ for me… it just keeps happening. |
ABOUT THE DESIGNS |
Q: What is your process when developing a new work?
A: I think I'm more of a designer than a painter or printmaker or sculptor. I started out as a printmaker, which gave me the habit of planning each image before actually picking up anything more than a pencil. Now when I paint or work in clay I find myself doing a lot of the same thing – I start out with a hazy idea and a mood, then work out all the design details in a precisely finished line drawing. And unless I'm working on a commission, love of design and drawing often make me feel ready to move on to my next idea at this point, but my love of color and my stubborn need to finish things usually keep me hooked till the end.
If I’m working on a painting, things progress much more easily if the line drawing is followed by a color study, but often I just don’t know about color until I actually begin painting, and in those cases I end up spending a lot of time standing back and deciding what comes next. I always thought of artists as visionaries who can’t work fast enough to keep up with what they already see clearly in their minds, but for me every work – especially those with human figures and faces – involves periods of anxiety-filled struggle before I'm satisfied... before I think it looks beautiful enough.