I try to create visually compelling paintings of home interiors. I present images of living rooms, unmade beds, empty bathrooms, and half-eaten meals that are devoid of human figures. My work focuses on the artifacts of daily human activity, revealing intimate and personal details of people’s everyday lives. The paintings also suggest a narrative, prompting the viewer to imagine the people who inhabit these spaces and the stories they might tell.

My paintings are characterized by their realistic style, which captures the textures, colors, and details of the objects portrayed. However, my use of distorted and slightly curving lines and planes subverts traditional renaissance perspective, inviting the viewer to question the conventions of representation.

Overall, my paintings invite people to reflect on the meaning of home and the ways in which we make our mark on the spaces we occupy. I hope my paintings challenge the viewer to see the beauty in the mundane and the profound in the everyday.

The show title Pots of Whimsey comes from a friend’s comment about the recent exhibition The Art of Marty & Richard Ray at the Irving Art Center. “All of the work is so whimsical” she said about our pottery and paintings.

This new 2025 exhibition presented at Craighead Green Gallery, includes pottery from past years and work finished early this year. Some of my personal favorites are the M & R Ray collaboration works. On these, I’ve made the pot and Richard has drawn into the clay. His freely drawn figures and imagination lead to happy pots even if a subject is serious. We both experiment with new color schemes, but his use of color can be more daring. It’s hard to believe we’ve been married for 52 years. A fun fact is that our first art collaboration was a small clay sculpture of an owl created the year we met.

Now let me talk about Whimsey and why I’ve had trouble writing this statement. Distracted by the current chaos of our government and  tragedies hurting people around the world, writing about whimsical art felt inappropriate. I was blocked to write about the joy and happiness of my pottery with so much sadness all around.

Then I looked back at past exhibition statements and found my own words on the subject: In 2012 I wrote “My work is always created for fun and for pleasure. If this work brings smiles and a bit of joy to others, its primary function is a success.” Again, in 2019 I wrote, “When my work brings smiles or any bit of joy, its primary function is a success.”

In the early months of 2025, these words still hold true and maybe are more important than ever.

Planes, edges and marks are all shifting in this body of work.

 Peripheral mark-making is front and center while some of my familiar imagery is taking a backstage. My process of mixing, pouring, layering and building using acrylic paints and canvas allows me to focus on ideas of spanning time and crossing borders within my life experiences to create a sense of space.

I am excited about the unpredictable, thoughts and associations that my finished works might evoke among viewers.