Born and raised in Southeastern Pennsylvania, I studied (as a teenager) at The Baum Art School in Allentown, Pennsylvania. Much later, I graduated from Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, with a degree in community service education. In between, I studied oil painting at Rhode Island School of Design for two years and the Ecole des Beaux Arts in Wavre, Belgium in their adult education programs. After raising a family and working, I returned to art by taking workshops at the Fingerlakes Art Workshop with visiting artists from the Art Students League in New York City, (and other venues) who traveled to Ithaca for summer classes.

While traveling with my husband on business trips to Europe, Hawaii, and the American West, I painted field studies that I transformed back in my studio in Ithaca. I used these studies and photographs for reference materials, to jog my memory, and help establish light and values. However, it is the idea and the inspiration of place that I always want to convey. I have been described as a “colorist” with a “painterly style” (particularly in my landscapes). I am fascinated with the enchantment of broad, wide-open skies and vistas, particularly sweeping sunsets over Cayuga Lake, and in the American Southwest and the Grand Tetons of Wyoming. Their magnificence, and breathtaking beauty, evoke a positive feeling and challenge to the senses. I try to capture this emotion on my canvases.

My recent work has been evolving to the abstract and semi-abstract, using the form and color of the natural world for inspiration. In my show, EVOLUTION, at the State of the Art Gallery (Ithaca, NY) during February 2008, my new work explores this universe in a more daring light.