I've pursued art making since I was big enough to hold a crayon, and fell in love with the printing process in my childhood, when I helped my father develop black and white photographs. Still drawn to the intense contrasts and pattern typical of woodcut and wood engraving, I enjoy employing these media, and also exploring how medium affects an image–by using woodcut, paint, graphite, and oil pastel to depict a single subject. With childhood trips to the national and state parks, early on I was inspired by landscapes and their inhabitants, which led me to study wildlife biology. I’m trained as a naturalist and also hold an M.A.T. (Masters of Arts in Teaching, art concentration) and an M.F.A. degree in printmaking from the University of Massachusetts. I studied art at Purdue University in Indiana, and Harlaxton College, Grantham, England.
I began my illustration career working primarily as a scientific illustrator and eventually branched out to do editorial illustration of newspapers and books, mural work and commissioned artwork. I'm a member of The Boston Printmakers and Zea Mays Printmaking, and a co-owner of Collective Copies, worker-cooperative print shops in Amherst and Florence, Massachusetts. I’ve exhibited my work at a variety of venues, including the Springfield Art Museum, Westfield State College, Holyoke Community College, R. Michelson Galleries, the Cultural Center of Cape Cod, Northampton Center for the Arts, the DeCordova Museum and Worthington Gallery, UT. I taught drawing, illustration, and relief printmaking at the University of Massachusetts and Holyoke Community College for twelve years and have taught the same subjects privately. I try to spend as much time as possible outdoors, and enjoy hiking, bicycling, jogging, ukulele and tap dancing. After growing up in Indiana and living in southern California, I‘m happy to be a long-time resident of the Pioneer Valley of western Massachusetts.
Clients include: Houghton Mifflin, Harcourt College Publishers, Peabody Museum, Princeton University Press, Academy Press, US Fish & Wildlife Service, MA Dept of Fish & Wildlife, LA Weekly, Boston Phoenix, Cricket Magazine, The Women's Times, Audubon Magazine, Teachers College Press, University of Massachusetts Press, Sinauer Associates, Mount Holyoke College, Smith College, Five Colleges Coastal & Marine Science.
In 2014 I participated in Artist-in Residence programs at Catoctin Mountain Park, MD, and Petrified Forest National Park, AZ, and in 2015 I was an Artist-in-Residence at Acadia National Park, ME, and Great Smoky Mountains National Park, TN. In 2019 I was the Darwin Lambert Artist-in-Residence at Great Basin National Park, NV.
