Raised in a blue-collar town in Central Connecticut I witnessed my mother oil painting as a five year old. With two children my mother had to give it up to have a paying income for us to move into our own house.
In the fourth grade I would finish math exercises early in order to work on my large poster painting mural of Hawaii on the back wall of our class. Art was always an exciting challenge inspired by my own visual perceptions.
After I completed my doctorate in Dental Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania I began taking semester courses in drawing and painting at the Montserrat College of Visual Art, The Decordova Museum School, The Cape Cod School of Art, The Fine Arts Workshop and the Museum School at the Boston Museum of Art.
As a young man I became a grandson to Gerrit Beneker and spent many summer weekends at the Beneker home in Truro. Enchanted by the hand poured window glass and antique clocks and still intact art studio, I began painting in his studio using his easels and brushes with a palpable sense of continuity and influence which has continued for me.
The light from land, sea and sky in my painting represents the formulation of a visual mood. On the outer Cape this can change quickly. Capturing the subtle nuances of light, shadow, weather, time of day and season all play upon the complexity of colors that I see. I use several techniques and layers of color value to achieve what I seek to express. I try to awaken the senses and the heart to the moment before us in the natural world. This, while evolving toward a more profound and captivating perspective. In the end it is an invitation to remembrance, reflection and the dimension of life within us and before us.
I have absorbed the surrealists, impressionists and post impressionists of American painters. My most recent influence lies in the technique and layered color values of Richard Meyhew. For me his work is another dimension in looking into the light and beauty of landscape.
Painting Light
Stand and slowly gather yourself
Judging the sky and looking toward the sea
The birds go on singing
As we march an Indian path
Past blueberry, ivy and sweet fern
Through the cushioned needles of the scrub pine.
Here now, there now
Time has slowed
We are here
Coming from there and passing
On silently and alone
To the light of our beginnings.
