ARTIST STATEMENT

I love using both my right and left brain. Using an objective and non-objective approach leverages years of classical training, with an opportunity to operate on automatic pilot in terms of play and intuitive decision-making.  Combining a calculated perspective or vision, with intuitive mark making, integrity and expression brings a certain "joie de vivre" that is peculiar to each artwork. And it is the strength of the calculated, balanced with the freedom of spontaneity, where art has the power to really sing, move and communicate a certain universal aesthetic that, to me, is unachievable by words or a particular linguistic. 

BIO

Raised in Baltimore, Maryland, my artistic talents were nurtured as a youngster attending Friends School and the Young Peoples' Art Studio at the Maryland Institute College of Art (MICA), from which I would eventually obtain my BFA, majoring in Sculpture— specifically, metal fabrication.  Before completing my BFA, my first ventures as a professional artist started in New York City, while attending Pratt Institute of Art, and working as a sculpture assistant for the late Maestro Arturo Di Modica in his studio in Soho. There, I helped Di Modica enlarge small scall maquettes into large scale monuments, such as the infamous Charging Bull which still stands today in the Financial District of Manhattan.  

After eight years of living in New York City, and traveling around the world, I returned to Maryland and worked at The Walters Art Museum, as an art handler and senior art collections manager.  At The Walters, I was inspired by (and continue to be inspired by) its vaunted collection of over 80,000 objects of art including masterworks of ancient Egypt, Greek sculpture and Roman sarcophagi, medieval ivories, illuminated manuscripts, Renaissance bronzes, Art Deco jewelry and ancient Near East, Mesopotamian items.  

While at The Walters, I worked a stint as a sculpture assistant for Washington DC sculptor Raymond J. Kaskey. Like my work with Di Modica, I helped Kaskey with the production of two monumental works based on his smaller maquette designs — The Power and Wisdom of the Law, which still stands today at the Ronald Reagan Federal Building in California, and the Treaty of Holston, which also still stands today, in Knoxville, Tennessee.  

Looking for more independent work, I moved west and began showing my work in museums and galleries throughout the U.S. and Japan, in solo exhibitions, group exhibitions and juried exhibitions. In Texas and Louisiana, I found pleasure in helping friends and community changemakers working in nonprofit organizations to further arts, education, and creative cultures in nationally recognized underserved areas. 

While serving as the outreach, gallery, education, and executive director of the Laredo Center for the Arts, as well as the president and executive director of the International Museum of Art & Science, and the Louisiana Art & Science Museum, I also took interest in furthering my own education and concurrently earned two graduate degrees: one from the University of Texas in Fine Arts and the other from Goucher College in Arts Administration. 

My graduate thesis, a dual MFA and MAAA, focused on arts participation for reducing stress— not only through personal experience, but also through medical science. Astonished by the medical research being only recently discovered as of around 2016 in Bavaria, Germany, which supported my own experiences — I found that my visual arts practice is a panacea for life, which science continues to demonstrate as fact.  It's through this artistic process that I get the chance to reconcile personal ideals with reality; challenges with solutions and enjoy life. 

It is my greatest hope that the aesthetic experiences achieved through these art works are as enjoyable to others as they were enjoyed by me in the making of these pieces! My art business has been designated as a "Trusted Art Seller" with The Art Storefronts Organization, which means you can shop with confidence, and know that I stand behind the quality and value of my products.