I grew up in New Jersey with parents who loved the arts — classical and jazz music, ballet, and visual arts.  They exposed me to dance and piano and encouraged me to attempt painting and drawing. I enjoyed creating chalk pastel paintings from my imagination.

Busy with other life activities, I dropped art for a while until exposed to aspiring talented artists at Carnegie Mellon University where I was a liberal arts student.  I took an art course at Carnegie, and later a watercolor class with Sharon Pitts, a New Jersey watercolorist.  I became inspired by Sharon to learn painting.

So, I taught myself to draw, then attempted watercolor and gouache paints.  I began by doing my own renditions of other artists’ works, and then graduated to my own subjects – from life or from photographs.  I love watercolor painting, but because I admired many oil-painting artists, I decided to switch from watercolors to acrylic paints, which I thought were as close to oil paints as I could get without exposing myself to odors and toxins.  I admired oil paint artists such as Tracy Turner, Mikki Senkarik, Erin Hanson and of course classical painters and impressionists.  I’ve studied youtube videos of artists’ techniques, when stuck on a painting  –  and just keep working at it.  Some paintings I considered failures and discarded.  Others I felt I succeeded.  This was rewarding and others have enjoyed my works.

My art has been accepted and exhibited in various gallery shows over the years.  My first show was in Socorro, NM, and more recently gallery shows in Costa Mesa, CA, on gallery row in downtown Los Angeles, Rancho Palos Verdes, Laguna Beach, CA, Red Bluff, CA, and others.