Mantis Painting

Born in Montgomery, Alabama, and raised in the rural Appalachian foothills of the northeastern part of the state, my childhood was surrounded by the natural world, the rigid social and cultural traditions of the deep South, the distant rumblings of 1960's social changes, and the panoramas of human existence revealed to me through reading, music and art. Most of my adult life has been spent working as a graphic designer in Birmingham, South Florida, and Dallas -- primarily in the television industry -- where I was immersed yet another hybrid universe, a fun-house world of ego, transitory celebrity, and social manipulation. These days I live and work in a cabin on the edge of the Ozark National Forest in northwest Arkansas, decompressing.