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In pursuing the medium of watercolor, I find ever more compelling and entrancing the qualities of color, light, reflection, luminosity and form as they appear and reappear in the visual world. I’m especially moved by the landscapes, seascapes, and architecture I observe during travels to western Europe, particularly in France and Scotland. I have also discovered with some delight that I can make something special out of the ordinary.

Indeed, so much of my inspiration flows from a deep attachment to each of these countries. As a young student I lived for a year in Brittany, but I also spent some of my time in Paris and the provinces. To this day I maintain a passion for the language and the cuisine. The impact upon me of French painting, especially the impressionists, endures. Who cannot be attracted to the dazzling and nuanced colors of Provence? For centuries it drew artists from everywhere. And Paris, inarguably the citadel of Western Art, continues to offer timeless and irresistible artistic vistas.

As for Scotland, it is the land of my father and our family’s clans and ancestors. Furthermore, it was my father who was my first artistic mentor. What I rediscovered over the last several years in visits to Scotland is the utterly awesome beauty of the Western Highlands - the incredibly volatile climate and shifts within hours of wind-driven purple skies and then brilliant rainbows and sunshine.

As a young child my earliest drawings and paintings earned me a scholarship to the Art Institute of Chicago. My serious study of watercolors, however, began relatively late in life when winding down my career as a clinical psychologist.

I now aspire to expand and to improve my palette and repertory, to study and to learn, knowing that the perfection I seek is unattainable.

To make something special out of the ordinary...


Copyright © 2004 | John B. Martin Gallery of Art

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