Painting has always been a form of therapy for me as well as a passionate love and a gift. Ever since I was a child, I was interested in creating with anything I could get my hands on; stick designs in dirt, drawing on cookbooks, watercolors over any paper I found. Once I met oils at age 6, I was hooked.

 

I received my BS in Art Ed from Mount Mary University and a Masters of Art in Visual Studies from Cardinal Stritch University in Wisconsin. My professional career began teaching art in middle school and quickly transitioned to high school where I saw potential in students and I pushed them to their artistic limits. After twenty years of teaching, our family moved to a place that had land where I could just "be". This land also contained my greatest gift; a barn where I created my dream art studio inspired by nature.

 

Painting combined with nature has always been a source of inspiration and healing for me. I find nature to be perfectly imperfect and absolutely breathtaking. From sunrises to sunsets, the beauty and symmetry of flowers, cyclical images are embedded into my abstract landscapes. I believe in the strong bond a cyclical image holds, and have captured circular forms of energy flowing in colorful-abstracted landscape environments with a playful feel since my early works.

 

My techniques have evolved as an artist, formally using paint brushes, I now use anything but. A lot of my mark making is from kitchen utensils, scraping tools and primarily palette knives used with oil and cold wax medium to provide a relief, stiffness and an abundance of texture. Texture and color are my most prevalent uses of elements and I strive to create movement and rhythm through the use of repetitive strokes and harmonious colors. I want to evoke a feeling, a memory, a visual moment of inner peace through a slice of happiness on canvas in my artwork that “begs to be touched”.