Artist Statement I was a late bloomer. Not interested in digging in the dirt, planting things or watching them grow.
I had no time to prune the roses much less smell them. I was a working mother…a commercial artist…an art director. All of my energy went to my job and raising my children.
Then something happened several years later. We bought a small house on Lake Erie. The only thing planted there was grass. We envisioned a few small flower beds. It's hard to keep the planting areas small. Flowers grow bigger and spread everywhere. Soon we were digging in the gardens every weekend, asking neighbors for starter plants to increase our variety. Bee Balm, Sedum, Black-eyed Susans, Spider wort, Daisies. The list is enormous.
I learned that gardening is very much like painting. It is having tremendous fun putting color where you think it will look right. The rewards for gardening are more than that. You get to be outdoors to hear the birds and the splashing of waves on the shore below the cliff, feel the breeze (sometimes strong wind) and discover a new kind of butterfly or see a humming bird.
I began to take pictures, eventually incorporating them into a book though Blurb.com.
Every year I did a painting of the view from my studio. I was inspired to do some big paintings of my garden by the lake. I allowed color to have its way with the canvas. Painting them has been a joy.