About the Art

 My creative process has evolved over the many decades that I have been studying, and teaching, the Elements and Principles of Art. I've participated in workshops with talented local artists, experimented on my own with materials and techniques, and made lots and lots of mistakes! The end result is an original approach which allows me to produce mixed media abstracted landscapes - paintings which allow viewers to connect with my art through their own memories of time and place.

The paintings I create are generally inspired by landscape photographs, most of which feature the awesome beauty of Canada. I use a wide range of techniques and materials to create my paintings. Some of my current go-tos include acrylic and latex paints, spray paint, collage, marble dust, silt, sand, salt, oil paint, and even liquid asphalt. I'm especially proud of this last, unusual, artistic medium, as I discovered it, quite by chance, several years ago. While I absolutely cannot be the only artist in the world using liquid asphalt in my art, when I picked up my first bottle, I had never heard of it being used for painting. To this date I have still never seen anyone use it as a painting and texturizing medium the way I do.

I go to great lengths to source art supplies which are made in Canada, from local Canadian retailers. While it is obviously important for me to choose materials which are archival and will stand the test of time, I'm also moving my practice in the direction of finding products which are environmentally sound.

Regarding the content of my art: my goal is to communicate the feeling of a time and place, not to create a painted copy of a photograph. In that sense, my paintings can be seen as emotional landscapes.

We all have memories and emotions tied to different landscapes: a summer sunset at the lake… fields of grain ripening in the sun… a day at the beach… standing on a ski hill and looking at the valley and mountains beyond… If you can engage with my art because it reminds you of a personal landscape, because it triggers a memory which is meaningful to you, I count that as success.

I try to make sure that every painting tells a story. The story is about a time and place. The story is about a feeling. The story is about me, but it is also about you, and about all of us.