I like to tell stories with my art. I use acrylics on cabinet doors, boards, canvas, scratchboards, but lately everything is ink pen and colored pencil. As a woman with a digital design career not centered on my handmade art, small ink sketches are all I have time to do. My paintings and scratchboards are time-consuming in a very enjoyable sense, but indeed they require intense periods of quiet concentration that don't exist at this point. But that is not a complaint, as I find drawing live scenes and conceptualizing ideas on paper to be immediately rewarding, and I can do more of them. They also may end up as larger paintings one day. That is the advantage of being an artist.

Looking at drawings is like watching someone think, and oftentimes with true thinking, there are struggles. When I draw from life directly or create scenes from my mind that are inspired by it, there is the constant challenge of representing weight, planes, angles, shadows and shapes, looking at things honestly and then questioning yourself if you are seeing clearly and objectively, reworking unbalanced compositions and correcting mistakes, and at the end when you've hit your mark and earned the right, embellishing a bit to burnish the story you are trying to tell, the thought you are trying to complete.

I particularly enjoy drawing people from life in little Moleskine books. Little drawings of people in everyday situations are sometimes better than a photo. When I draw from life scenes I feel part spy, part biologist. Most people don't know they are subjects, as in my Trirail sketches, and each person depicted has their own story you normally wouldn't have ever wondered about. We see strangers every day, and particularly if you're a city girl like me, you don't think too much of it. But the little drawings allow an intimacy not allowed in everyday life, mundane scenes become small worlds.

The art that is not made directly from life is at least inspired by it. I like realism, albeit modified. I try to have fun with my visual puns through color and a comic book, pop sensibility. The hair paintings are an example. I picked 4 people from my 1987 high school yearbook and painted a portrait of their hair, sans face or head. So, we have hairstyles floating on a solid background of color. What I am trying to say is that sometimes, our hair, or other exterior accoutrements, identify us more than what lies beneath. I was full of giggles painting these, and they give others the giggles. If I can get a giggle or smirk, I know I'm headed in the right direction.

I will continue with my little drawings for for a while, and when my schedule permits, I will resume painting.

Boston is my original home and my family is still there, but I have lived all over the country. Currently I live in Hollywood, Florida with my fiance Matt Ludlow, our two kitties Marble and Clive. I work as a graphic designer in the web industry.