I have always made art, of one kind or another. Growing up, I filled my spare time with drawing, painting, and making assemblages from found objects. Throughout high school and college I focused on drawing , painting, and graphic design.

 

While completing my art education coursework I happened upon a ceramics class at UW-O taught by Paul Donhauser and fell in love with clay. The functional ceramics of Warren McKenzie remains a great source of inspiration.  And a trip to Italy in 2009 inspired me to return to my first love, oil painting. Recently, I have shifted my focus from creating functional ceramics to painting landscapes, still lifes, and portraits.

 

Teaching art to my students has also been a source of inspiration. I have taught students from first through twelfth grade, in every medium: textile design, painting, drawing, printmaking, metals, sculpture, photography, and ceramics.  I look forward to teaching art classes to adults and children at Riverwalk Art Center, which I founded in 2011. Riverwalk Art Center is presently an art gallery featuring the work of regional artists, both professional and emerging, working in a wide variety of media and styles. I envision Riverwalk growing as a cultural center in Fond du Lac, showcasing local art, and providing a meeting place for artists, art collectors, art students and art lovers.

 

I make art to express thoughts and emotions that I can’t express with words. I create pottery that attracts the eye and tempts the hand to touch it, to hold it, to interact intimately with it. I paint to express joy, humor, anxiety, peace of mind and all the other emotions that can only be communicated with color, value, shape, and texture.