My journey as an artist began shortly after graduating college and taking my first drawing class in Portland Oregon's adjunct school to the Portland Art Museum.  From that moment forward I was forever in and out of art classes satisfying my hunger for depicting the world around me in a two dimensional format.  The experience became as much of a discovery process than an acquisition of skill as my objectivity of the world around me increased and my focus shifted to a visual understanding of what surrounded me.  The world became a series of designs.  It was intoxicating.  It was humbling.  It was deeply satisfying.  The process of art for me evolved into a relationship between how I viewed, and felt about a subject matter and the manner in which I depicted it upon my canvas.  This is a lifetime relationship full of rewards, growth, frustration, humility and an ever deepening respect of the subjects whose spirit I strive to capture.

So now the whole world looks like a giant painting.  I can't see anything anymore without reshaping it into brushstrokes of oil paint!  Or doing a quick mental sketch in my mind.