My early engagement with art is summarized in the About page. Between the time I graduated with an M.S. and started my “real” career, I didn’t do much painting, or writing, until my late 40’s. By then I was teaching in Asheville, North Carolina and had more time and flexibility to reconnect to myself. I no longer thought of myself as a “serious artist”, I just went back to my early love of landscapes and watercolors.
In Asheville I discovered a deep love for the “almost nothing” nature of watercolor painting, a medium that agrees with my spirit and keeps me humble. While I had some thoughts of selling my work, I never had enough time to become that skilled or productive. Each painting took many hours of work. I loved the mountain forests and creeks around Asheville, covered with rhododendron, azalea, and mountain laurel, lit up with a million wildflowers in the spring (trillium, fire pinks, bloodroot, solomon’s seal, may apples, jack in the pulpit, .. ), and filled with the songs of the Carolina Wren, Towhees, and the Pileated Woodpecker. The subtle shapes of the rhododendron leaves never failed to challenge me, and the deep shadows of the Blue Ridge always suggested a secret and mysterious world, forever just out of reach. Most days I would hike along the trails of the North Carolina Arboretum, into the Pisgah Wilderness, or up around Black Balsam, where I could fill a backpack with wild blueberries on a single August day.