PICKET FENCE Painting

As a young child color was like food for me, bowls of fruits, bolts of fabric, bouquets of flowers nurtured me more than my lunch box. I drew faces on my worksheets and while friends had lemonade stands, I sold my hand painted clamshells. My training as an artist began at age 17 when I spent 5 years in studio and academic classes, receiving a combined BFA in SCULPTURE and PAINTING from the UNIVERSITY of CHICAGO and the ART INSTITUTE of CHICAGO. Shortly after, I earned an MFA from the University of Chicago and proceeded to teach art history in their extension program and sculpture at the University’s Midway studios. I began my professional career as a sculptor molding and welding steel, which led to carving wood, exploring the contrast of organic forms with stainless steel, creating monumental pieces using railroad ties and 10-foot welded steel bars. Exhibitions followed in Chicago at the ZOLA LIEBERMAN gallery, MIDWAY STUDIO Gallery and an INTERNATIONAL EXHIBITION in Vermont. I was awarded a sculptor’s studio at the prestigious CITÉ INTERNATIONAL DES ARTS in Paris. Moving my family to Paris was a seminal event in my life and the focus of my work shifted. I proceeded to carve anthropomorphic forms from aged oak beams, which I combined with cool reflecting stainless steel rods. My works sold to private collections and were featured in “Leonardo”, the International Journal of Contemporary Visual Artists. I also co-created a PERFORMANCE ART PIECE with a young French choreographer and dancer who interpreted 5 of my Sculptures to the music of Phillip Glass. Toward the end of the 3 years in Paris I was carving heads with birds on top and began a Series of Seven, 6 to 9-foot TREE WOMEN, that I carved with chisels and circular sanders. To further create shadow and negative space, I burned the wood with an oxyacetylene torch, defining hair, breast, and thigh, blending female and tree. Four of these pieces are in private collections in Chicago and California. After returning to Chicago, I spent 15 years studying and working with patients to become a psychoanalyst. The focus of my work as an artist shifted from carving to two-dimensional works on paper with inks, charcoal and pastel.