BACKGROUND
My first drawings were often from fashion magazine at a young age. I took drawing lessons in my teens and then attended the Rhode Island School of Design’s high school summer program. This led me to train at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts/Tufts (BFA) and the Academy of Art University (MFA).
While creating an evolving body of work, I began teaching at Sonoma State University and local Northern California and, later, Boston area art programs. This led to becoming a full professor with the Art Institutes Online. I love teaching all levels and ages of students, but have a particular proclivity toward my beginning students. Having had the full range of experiences with faculty in my past I strive to individuate the learning and critique process in order for each student to progress.
I attended Harvard University’s Arts Education program to further my arts education teaching and in order to conduct research into thinking about artists as exemplary role models. In 2018, I received my doctorate from Boston University. My dissertation was entitled, The Restoration of Goethe’s 18th Century Beautiful Soul Ideal in the Lives and Works of Six Exemplary Visual Artists: Wassily Kandinsky, Käthe Kollwitz, Jacob Lawrence, Mark Rothko, Vincent van Gogh and Remedios Varo.
My work has been in many galleries, alternative venues, and museums in the U.S. and Rome, Italy.
MEDIA, INSPIRATION
My work has evolved using a range of media.
My first love has always been drawing. When I was ten years old I began lessons in still life drawing. During my teens I studied the human form and anatomy. I learned perspective techniques to the important element of depth and space to create more complex compositions. My Catholic background and years living in Europe as a youngster were extremely formative as our family toured the many beautiful sites. My drawings and paintings reference the figure, nature, architecture, and classical form. My goal is to take inspirational imagery that has inspired me with the goal of creating a contemplative experience for the viewer. I’ve also created large scale installations which are more documentary in nature. For The Witness Project, I drew oversized charcoal and pastel drawings, juxtaposed with garments from rescue workers, and conceptual costumes. The goal was to offer the viewer, who may have been unable to visit the site during the cleanup, a small way to experience and process the tragic aftermath of what happened at Ground Zero, NYC. The date of the imagery conveyed was 12/2/2001.
During my masters program at the Academy of Art University I learned about many historical women artists who have come before me. In 2000, I wrote a script and created costumes for a play, Vanishing Point, about Baroque woman artist Artemisia Gentileschi. The play was performed by Italian actors at the Palazzo Borghese, Rome among the galleries of an exhibition of Artemisia and her father, Orazio Gentileschi. It was also performed in Boston and NYC.
INSPIRATION
Inspiration comes to me in surprising and wonderful ways. My most vivid and earliest memory was seeing Michelangelo’s Pietà at St. Peter’s Basilica Italy when I was 7 years old. Experiencing the power of how art can transform the viewer shaped my desire to become an artist. I love to travel near and far and am often inspired by works of art, architecture, sacred sites, and nature. My goal is to create visual work from this inspiration in order for the viewer to experience what may seem familiar in a new and contemplative manner.
I love to indulge a long time love of costume and fashion by creating conceptual costumes. I typically use recycled wedding garments for installation and performance work. Applying beading, crystals, paint, and collaged imagery transforms the garments already embedded with deep meaning into an artwork that can be more approachable with an added human element.
My current installation, A Visual Representation of the Beautiful Soul Ideal, will convey my dissertation research in visual form including garments, large scale natural and classical drawings.