I love trees. I love to breathe in their smell and hug them.  I appreciate that they show us what season it is, and are always beautiful, even in Winter.  But I have learned so much more from the book, THE HIDDEN LIFE OF TREES, by Peter Wolleben.  Trees take care of one another.  If a tree needs nurture, it extends its branches to the neighboring tree, who responds with loving embrace.  That's what's happening in this painting. The tree on the left is my favorite tree, that I hug in every season. It is old and weary and it is reaching toward the tree on the right, which reciprocates in kind.  This is how we should all treat each other.  What a wonderful world it would be!

I find deer so inspiring.  Something wonderful has happened lately.  When I walk my dog, Snowball, around dusk, we see deer and the deer see us.  Snowball doesn't bark.  All is still. In that stillness I feel something magnificent pass between the deer and me.  There is something greater than the petty differences that keep people apart.  There is something greater, which I feel, in the presence of deer.

Sylvester, the Tuxedo Cat, adopted our backyard and garage several years ago.  He has become my muse (see the Sylvester page on this website).  He tolerates my presence in the backyard, as he suns himself and gives himself a bath.  He lets me take his photo. But he is a free agent who doesn't usually linger very long.
This idyll was interrupted when Snowball, the West Highland Terrier, came into our family.  We adopted him, and I love him like a son (see the Snowball page on this website).  He is sweet as pie and wouldn't hurt a fly, but he is a dog and a Westie at that, so he is very territorial.  He loves our backyard because it has many wild spots where he can dig and do a ton of smelling.  He's a regular detective when it comes to smelling.
He and Sylvester always seemed to be in the backyard at different times.  Sylvester had probably learned Snowball's schedule and stayed clear.
This beautiful summer day I was on my chaise lounge reading a favorite Alexander McCall Smith novel (Isabel Dalhousie, THE GEOMETRY OF HOLDING HANDS).  I was getting lost in her philosophical musings and how we should all treat each other with respect, when I heard a strange whirring sound.  The air around me seemed to change.
I looked up to see Snowball, now a fierce Highland Warrior, chasing the startled Sylvester around in ever narrowing circles.  Then with one swift leap, Sylvester jumped the fence, leaving little Snowball, who can't even manage to jump on our bed, in the
dust.
They're brothers, but like Cain and Abel they haven't learned to get along!
Anyway, they both are an inspiration to me, and this is their first painting together. Acrylic, 24" H X 24" W

Hubert and Kalisa were a famous lion couple at the LA Zoo.  They were famous for being in love with each other.  They met at the Zoo in 2014.  They grew old together, (age 21). They should have been allowed to go into that sweet sunset together.  Unfortunately, they were not allowed to die naturally. This breaks my heart.  But hopefully, they will be remembered in the wonderful photographs taken of the two of them, and in my painting.  Oil, 20"H X 24" W.  I wanted to capture their being part of something greater than themselves, as those who are lucky to grow old together, in a long happy marriage, know so well.

These 4 paintings are in a Juried Virtual Exhibit at Colors of Humanity Gallery "Botanicals 2020" www.colorofhumanitygallery.com August1-August 31, 2020

I am thrilled to announce the Montclair Art Museum is having a virtural exhibition and sale JAM AT MAM.  These three paintings of mine, DEER IN MY GARDEN, ROBIN IN THE LEAVES, and  BOY IN THE WOODS, will be on exhibit and for sale at Jam At Mam(https://www.montclairartmuseum.org/jam/mam), 6/18/20-9/16/20. 40% goes to the very worthy museum and  10% will go to agencies that serve human need.  So you'll be helping charity and the museum when you buy one of my paintings!

One of the most wondrous New York City Events, is the Orchid Show at the New York Botanical Garden.  This year's show was spectacular!  The theme was kaleidoscope and there was a kaleidoscope of glorious orchid colors.  We went with our Granddaughter, Pari, and she is as beautiful as any orchid.  Hence my painting, Pari Among The Orchids, Oil, 30" H X 24" W.  Alas, like everything else, the Orchid Show has been shut down because of that virus that is wreaking havoc around the world.  Stay calm, and breathe in the beauty of orchids, if only through my painting.  Let us hope, we will resume our lives, soon, in the beautiful Spring, yet to come.

These five paintings will be on exhibit at La Vie Galerie, 106 Naylon Ave., Livingston, NJ in the All About Love Exhibit. The reception is February 23, 12-4.  The paintings will be on exhibit through April 3, 2020.  Obviously, what links these paintings is the theme of love.  And of course, they were painted from the heart.

I love flowers and gardens, and this is because of my mother.  I remember her tending the snapdragons, pansies, and most of all the roses, of every color, in her Los Angeles garden.  And I was intimate with those flowers! I used to talk to them, like Alice did in Wonderland. I swung over them on my swing.  I breathed in their perfume.  I lay under the fuchsia bush and watched the hummingbirds spin over my head.  Butterflies filled the turquoise sky, the same color as my mother's eyes. And deeply blue and purple morning glories climbed the fence.  This painting is a memory.  A memory of a little girl who loved her mother and the flowers she brought into my life.

I am reading, THE COLLECTOR'S APPRENTICE, by, B.A. Shapiro. It's a wonderful novel about the Barnes Collection and the extraordinary art of the Post-Impressionists.  The protagonist, Vivienne, is particularly enthralled by the paintings of Matisse.  She describes each painting with such delicacy and care, the use of color, the play of light, the shape and beauty of objects and textiles.  Thanks to Google Image, I have looked up each painting as she describes it more than once.  This has revived my love of Matisse, and the many times I have viewed his work up close at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
So I wanted to paint in the style of Matisse.  Especially when I saw my lovely niece, Kate in her mother's house, aglow in Brooklyn light. Brooklyn has unusual and beautiful light that shines in interiors, as so elegiacally described by Pete Hamill in much of his writing about his native Park Slope.  The light comes in the window and bathes all in its soft glow. And so it was, that day, in my sister Linda's Park Slope apartment.  I believed I was looking at a living Matisse, and I wanted to paint it.