ARTIST'S STATEMENT

I started doing my art later in life. My career had been in book publishing, journalism, editing and creative writing. I have always kept diaries and journals.

In my fifties, after several major life-­changing events, I suddenly felt I had run out of words. I was tired of words. I didn't want to put down my journals though, and I thought, “I'm going to draw something instead.”

I drew the first thing I looked up and saw--my living room lamp. The days passed and I kept on. I drew my table, the vase, the chair, my shower curtain, my tub, my feet, the view from my window.

I wrote brief descriptions next to these drawings; what they evoked in me--events, people, memories, colors.

Sometimes when and what I was writing in my journal led me to an idea for an entire scene. My drawings were morphing into cartoon-­like stories. The writing on them turned more detailed and more psychological. Childhood memories were coming to me visually and full­ blown--necessitating color, thought bubbles, and more text. The ratio of words to pictures felt right.

Writing came back--in forms that worked for me. My artwork emerged organically from these journals.

I started doing collages. Personal stories and life circumstances continued to be driving forces. My oldest son--an artist--suggested I use my “To Do” lists and daily planner pages. (“They look like Cy Twombley drawings, Mom.”) If my crazy lists could be part of my work, what else could?

I've always admired graphic novels, cartoons, cartoonists, Latin American art, shrines, and built environments in miniature--assemblages, mixed media. More and more of the narrative ideas were coming to me as 3­-Dimensional compositions. Color, color interaction, and the aesthetic placement of shapes and forms directed my construction as much as the story-­telling.

Media and materials include: pen and ink, colored pencils, acrylic paint, modeling paste, polymer clay, glitter, mirrors, fabric, packing materials, found objects, miniatures, photographic images, costume jewelry, electrical parts, labels, balsa wood, gardening supplies--and things I remember as I go that I've saved and stashed in my apartment.

The scale of my work is time and again influenced by the particulars of living in a small New York City apartment. I read somewhere that a lot of artists in New York City work small because of space and storage issues. I love that--it's all about the closet space.