My interest and involvement in art has been life-long.  I recall my first notable piece of art was done from a “Draw Me” matchbook cover around the age of five and shown to a neighbor.  Right from the start with her praise and encouragement, I was hooked.

 

I am a Connecticut native and a New Hampshire transplant, born in Bridgeport, Connecticut. I attended the Paier College of Art in New Haven, Connecticut for two years after high school and was convinced that in that time, I had learned all that I needed to know.  I then promptly took a job as an oral surgeon assistant…interesting work but a bit off the track for what I had trained for.  Throw in a few years as a graphic designer after that and I was looking for a better way to pursue and grow my career as an artist.  I did free-lance illustration for over a dozen years, doing work for advertising agencies, magazine publications and editorial assignments. I then turned back to fine arts which has always been my first love and where I hope to remain.

 

When you find the medium you truly love following the years of searching, with it comes the ability for expression.  I believe my personal strength as an artist is working in graphite and have worked a long time to develop my specific style of realism and level of quality.  I use Bristol Board with a smooth finish. Leads used are varied from HB to 4B.  Acrylic paints are used in a wash when color is used to highlight a portion of the drawing.  My pieces take anywhere from fifty to two hundred hours depending on the size and detail involved. I am in control of this medium, taking great pleasure in watching a piece come to life before me. I was greatly influenced in the style of sharp focus by artists Ken Davies and Paul Lipp who were two of my professors at Paier.

 

Developing an idea can come from anything around me as everywhere I look is a potential drawing. I enjoy taking the ordinary and putting them in unexpected surroundings or give an unusual perspective of the subject. My desire is to get the viewer’s thought process to extend beyond the natural order of things  and to suggest a range of emotions from humor to hope.  My work is meant to be studied at close range with the viewer moved to explore the connection between the image and the word. I challenge myself with each piece, isolate just a portion of a scene, object or person in sharp focus, develop a mood within it and transform it to a level of fine art.  Beyond my family, it is my greatest joy.

 

EXHIBITIONS:

The Previt Gallery – Amherst, NH – group show
The Casual Cat Gallery – Amherst, NH – 1 person show
The Anderson-Soule Gallery – Concord, NH – 4 person show
The Museum of Arts, Science and Industry – Bridgeport, CT – 2 person show
The Sharon Arts Center – Peterborough, NH – 3 person show
The Granary Gallery – West Tisbury, MA – 3 person show – 1997
The Granary Gallery – West Tisbury, MA – 3 person show – 1998
The Granary Gallery – West Tisbury, MA – 3 person show – 2000
University of Bridgeport – Bridgeport, CT – 1 person show – 2012
The Whitney Galleries – Wells, Maine – May 2015 – one person show
The Whitney Galleries – Wells, Maine – July 2016 – one person show

PUBLISHERS:
McGraw Hill

D.C. Heath

Houghton-Mifflin

 

ADVERTISING:
Holiday Inn
Blue Cross
Tipperary Irish Spring Water
Hancock Paints
The Granite Bank

 

EDITORIAL PUBLICATIONS:
Yankee Magazine, Tennis Magazine, Connecticut Magazine, Cooks Magazine, Boston Magazine, Golf Digest, Walking Magazine, Horticulture Magazine and Fairfield and Long Island Life Magazines

I have been a member of the Copley Society of Art in Boston, MA, since 2000, achieving the level of Copley Artist. I was also one of the first women elected to membership at the Salmagundi Club in New York City