Statement

2008 Artist Statement

My world has always been about people and places.  As a geographer, I have traveled extensively, and I have always enjoyed teaching my students about other people and places.  It is not surprising that the same theme runs through my art. I try to capture the essence of a place through the built environment or the people within it.

I am interested in shapes and colors.  I enjoy simplifying forms into flat, two-dimensional spaces that have interesting arrangements whether they involve people or the man-made environment.  I am attracted to geometric rather than naturalistic form.  I am also very responsive to color which I use to convey my emotional response to the subject.

Most of my work is in watercolor, although I sometimes use oils and acrylics.  I enjoy the other mediums but most of all I like the velvety, flat, intense color I can achieve in watercolor. Transparent watercolor yields the most exciting colors but increasingly I am using or mixing opaque watercolors to keep color flat. My painting technique involves using very little water which means that in some ways it differs little from using oil or acrylic.

The last few years have been good for my painting because I have now retired from the university and spent a lot more time at my easel.  In 2004 I won Best of Show at the Art Guild of the Kennebunks summer show and I was accepted into the New England Watercolor Society’s 9th Biennial Show and given the Rines Award for Excellence in Abstraction. (I was also accepted into the New England regional show for 2005, the 10th Biennial Show in 2006 and invited to join the “Masters in Watercolor” exhibit in New Bedford in 2006). In April 2006 I was part of a large three-person show at the Rhode Island Watercolor Society. I was also juried into the Northeast Watercolor Society’s 30th International exhibition in Kent, Connecticut in 2006 and the 31st International exhibition in 2007. Last year I was awarded the Sam Flax Award at the Georgia Watercolor Society National Exhibition and also won First Place in the Art Guild of the Kennebunks summer show.

One of my paintings was featured in an article by Skip Lawrence entitled “Viva la Difference” in Issue 16, January 06 of the Palette Magazine, an artists magazine published by Skip Lawrence and Christopher Schink.  In Issue 24 there was a two page description of my paintings and my graphic style and also this year in Issue 26 another article describing my painting process.

Three of my paintings are now installed in the Southern Maine Medical Center in Biddeford, Maine.