There is a sort of elation about sunlight on the upper part of a house. - Edward Hopper

ARTIST’S STATEMENT

I am a seventh generation Texan with a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in Studio Art from the University of Texas at Austin.

Living in Texas all my life, I have grown to love the transforming beauty of the sun. Bright sunshine on simple objects is what inspires me to paint. When I notice the yellow-white summer sun cooking highways, steel structures or sand, I imagine it as a painting. I notice the wintry sun, too. It has a cool brightness which cuts razor sharp shadows on smooth concrete.

I am not drawn to the prettiness of a place or to the story behind it, but to the way it is transformed by light. I do not choose highway overpasses as subjects because they are primary symbols of modern civilization, not consciously at least, but because their form changes at different times of day in different light.

It is fun to remove as much as I can from a landscape, getting it all on the canvas and then taking out everything that is not necessary. They become commonplace, encouraging the viewer to create their own narrative. “I have been on that highway. I remember it.”

Studying the work of many painters inspires me, especially: Jan Vermeer’s ordinary subjects bathed in Holland’s light pouring in windows, Edward Hopper’s captured sunlight on New England clapboard, and Wayne Thiebaud’s color saturated fields and California asphalt.

Retired now from teaching, I have taught art to thousands of children in public schools, my own private studio and in museums. I hope I have inspired them to see themselves as artists.

My husband and I live surrounded by sunny limestone on Lake Belton, outside of Austin. We enjoy three children and five grandchildren.