“Little Artist”:  My love of art began very early, when at age three, I painted a mural with fingernail polish in the hallway of my family’s brand new house, forevermore earning me the nickname “Little Artist”.  Throughout my childhood I filled the margins of my homework with drawings. I used every scrap of paper I could find and every shirt card from my Dad’s dry cleaning, to copy the fashion illustrations from my Mother’s pattern envelopes. My parents realized the seriousness of my desire and entered me in art classes taught by Dot Graf in Cullman, Alabama. She was a fantastic artist and wonderful teacher who inspired my life-long study, experimentation, and love of painting. Afterwards, I attended Ringling School of Art in Sarasota, Florida focusing on fine arts. My next step was Harris School of Art in Nashville, TN where I followed a commercial path in fashion illustration.

First Career: Fashion illustration turned out to be my perfect job. It was a fun place to play every day for many years, in various department stores and clothing manufacturing companies, albeit at a faster pace than ever imagined (whew!).  After enjoying many years in a dream profession, the technological changes in the way commercial art was produced started to nudge me back to my original love of painting. Passing the colorful fruit stands on the way to work had already started haunting me; sometimes to the point of pressuring me to schreech the brakes in order to stop and capture that colorful, seasonal sight in a watercolor, right then and there! Deep down, I realized my true passion, and thankfully the gradual usage of technology, photography, and computers forced me to make the transition, though I didn’t consider it such a great thing at the time. I had to say goodbye to a glorious fashion illustrator career.

Self-Discovery: Re-inventing myself from tight commercial rendering to the freer expression of paint on canvas has been surprisingly challenging. At first it was difficult finding motivation, confidence, and self-direction, not to mention the hurdle of developing my style again. One day, as I was listening to Jimi Hendrix perform during a documentary of Woodstock on TV, I was struggling with a painting that, in my opinion, seemed to be going nowhere good. I realized the music dramatically loosened up my attitude and technique, bringing me back to that “fun place” I had experienced as a fashion illustrator, and reduced my fear and stress. Perhaps it took Jimi’s unusual rendition of “The Star Spangled Banner” to shock me into a more creative state and give me permission to simply paint with no worries of what someone else might think. Since then, I paint to music almost every day. The music can severely change the direction of the painting, or even at times, the painting starts to take on the personality of the music. Overall, it makes me happy, frees up my technique, inspires my creative process and gets me in the mood to paint with no fear. Music has surely become my muse. I crank it up and, so far, I’ve had no complaints from my neighbors. Art is fun again!

Finally: My artistic interests and recent endeavors include: Fine Art, Back Drops, Murals, Classes, Workshops, Caricatures, and Jewelry. Acrylics are my favorite painting medium, but nothing is off limits. My goals are to use my God-given talents to record my surroundings and emotions; help other artists in their artistic process and to bring some happiness to others with my art.