Collage/Paintings

An Owl Visit

On New Year's Day 2025, an owl visit inspired this collage. In some spiritual traditions, owls are symbols of wisdom, insight and mystery. An owl sighting can also symbolize personal transformation as we navigate the darker aspects of life and come out stronger on the other side.,

Inner Child

In those moments when something new and surprising happens, if you pause and pay attention, you may sense your inner child is leaping with joy.

Being Joy

Being Joy was created during an art class in 2011, the very first time I put paint to canvas. Beginner's mind freed me from any constraints about color theory or composition and allowed me to relax into not-knowing. The result was an experience of being in flow which lasted the full two-hours of this painting class. At the time, I was grieving, and later found this Rumi poem that captured what I believe is true about joy - that it is inseparable from sorrow. I was struck by how well the painting and Rumi's words fit together.

Sorrow prepares you for joy.

It violently sweeps everything

out of your house, so that new joy

can find space to enter.

It shakes the yellow leaves

from the bough of your heart,

so that fresh, green leaves

can grow in their place.

~ Rumi

The Message

The Message began as a painting that remained unfinished until years later, when it morphed into a collage. The addition of a house in the woods on a moonlit night, a crow sitting in a tree with a gold key hanging from a branch and an approaching visitor delivering a message, begs the questions, "who lives in this house" and "what might the message be?"

In the Cards

In the Cards is another collage that first began life as a painting. The little girl is holding a broken rose, which is a symbol of loss. She is wearing a satin dress, but there are no other clues about what the fortune teller has predicted for her future. What fate do the cards hold for this little girl? In life, will she draw the fourth ace or, with the hand she was dealt, is she already a winner? Is the owl alarmed or merely observing as her fate unfolds?

Hidden Gems

Hidden Gems was created during an experience of flow in which shapes seemed to appear hidden in the canvas itself.

Autumnal Magic

Autumnal Magic was created on an autumn afternoon as I contemplated the colors of nature outside my window. While this plant does not exist in reality, these colors are ones I most love...olive, gold, burgundy and rust.