The Receptive Painting

Raised in Southern California, I am a professional artist and member of Los Angeles Art Association Gallery 825, and am also currently pursuing a Masters degree in Chinese Medicine at the Oregon College of Oriental Medicine. I lead workshops and lectures in both art and Chinese Medicine. My work is a commentary on the full spectrum of aliveness and is influenced by my lifelong research into healing. It is a celebration and a contemplation, and my titles often arise out of time studying Celtic thought, philosophy, nature writing, and East Asian thought such as the I-Ching and The Dao De Jing. While I am influenced by these and other sources, I encourage viewers to be open, flexible and creative when spending time with the artwork, drawing out their own unique experiences and resonances. ​ Through painting, drawing and installation, I build a language of bold color and mark-making while inquiring into the intersection of art and healing. I create dimension, depth and movement in my compositions, attending to the interplay between geometric and organic shapes. I work on large surfaces to actively engage and integrate the physical with the mental-emotional space as a visual meditation, utilizing number, letter, layer and color in conversation. My work is informed by a decade of philosophical and creative research and I am currently pursuing a Masters in Chinese Medicine where I practice and study acupuncture, herbs, movement therapy, Shiatsu massage and Craniosacral therapy. Chinese Medicine is informed by the balance of the yin-yang symbol, the relationship and overlap between light and dark found within nature, and the inseparability of the body and the mind. I carry this influence and observation of nature onto the canvas, attending to the timing, cycles, patterns, colors, chaos, celebration and order that the natural world holds. I am an integrative artist who is informed and influenced by her philosophical and healing studies. I build my paintings with a passion for language, color relationships, and formal elements and principles of design as I observe what it means to build a life. Is it possible to move beyond dualistic concepts of good and bad, right and wrong, and into something more expansive? This is my quest in the studio. ​