Telling stories has always been part of me -- whether as a kid creating wild and fantastical adventures for myself and my friends to adult me writing stories and poems and songs. My artistic work follows this same thread. Every piece of art I create has a story attached to it, every piece comes from deep within me. 

 

While I've painted using watercolor, done some previous oil pastel and oil or acrylic painting, it's only recently that I've begun to take my artistic practice more seriously, to understand that other people might also be interested in the stories I was telling with my art. To this end, I've generally focused on oil pastel, loving the flow of the colors, the way the pigments blend together and also relishing the challenge of rendering details in a medium that doesn't encourage details. I've always appreciated a challenge. 

 

The movement of light and water and bodies is a consistent theme in all my works. From the movement of the water in watercolor on the page to the movement of my fingers as I blend oil pastels, I am constantly trying to capture dance and light. 

 

I’ve lived a whole bevy of (sometimes) wild lives: teacher, archivist, small-town newspaper columnist, and (unsuccessful) turkey wrangler. I've roamed ancient byways with Welsh folk musicians, faced off bears and grad school and my own health, all of which have contributed to more art. Painting and oil pastels were originally a way to manage my anxiety, but they've turned into an obsession. So now there's always a little pastel in my hair and paint on my fingers.