To be an artist is to believe in life. --Henry Moore

Recently, I was visiting my friend who has a couple of my earliest oil paintings, and I realized one was my very first.  My instant affinity for working with oil paint, all came back to me…how organic and immediate it felt.  I spent years doing black and white, film photography, as well as forays into sculpture. However, once I started playing with oils, I couldn't stop.  I cleared out a space in the garage, which I shared with Jeff's rebuilt Farmall tractor, logging equipment and other junk.  In my “art” cave, I started painting every day, while my daughter, Eliza, was at school.  Seeing my first awkward painting, takes me back to the fun challenges I had during those few years in Healdsburg, reading everything I could find about oils and figuring things out. I also took 2 semesters of painting courses at Santa Rosa Junior College, when I could. 

However, I had to refrain when we moved to Arizona and had a business to run, a family to tend and a teaching career to grow.  The picture changed when serious health concerns developed. We decided to make a new start, returning to Humboldt County, CA.

Once we moved back to Humboldt County, after a couple years working on managing my health, I started to think about making time to paint and found the Sunday Paintout group on Facebook.  I haven't stopped painting since, thanks to this group of good people and the Humboldt County places we paint!  In spite of a few large family events, painting has carried me through, by giving me a way to connect with people and nature and my own expression of my values. 

Life is good (as my father and his father always said).

Below is an early painting from those 3 years in the garage where I was feeling my way.  It is of our daughter, Eliza, and her cat, Pigtail, in our apartment in Healdsburg.  It's called "Piano Practice".  The original is not for sale, but it is available in the Print Store.