I was born in Brantford, Ontario and now live in St. Thomas. I studied Advertising Art/Design Mohawk College, Hamilton and my first full-time job was as a graphic artist and later Art Director for a design/print firm in Paris, Ontario. In London, Ontario, after putting in a stint as a writer/producer at CBC affiliate CFPL-TV, I started to focus on painting. I later opened and operated a gallery from 1987 to 1992 that showcased paintings and sculpture of local and regional artists.
I’ve been very fortunate, after 3 decades of creating, to have works in hundreds of private and corporate collections, mostly in Canada but also many countries worldwide. I’ve enjoyed participating in dozens of group and gallery shows in Canada and the U.S. I tend to work in series. My current work includes a series of simplified and stylized landscapes called “Earth Tones”, working from memory or field sketches, the elements in the scenes are usually depicted as simple, pure shapes. Early on I created a bold watercolour painting series that captured the sensation of movement of birds and animals in the “Metaphysical Fauna” series. “To accomplish this I use colours and abstracted backgrounds, merged with the subject, of what I imagine to be the aura of energy created by the moving bird or animal.” That series comprises over 200 paintings. I now use that same technique to capture energy and excitement in a portrait series of original paintings.
My work also includes semi-abstracted sculptures from Brazilian soapstone and art guitars. In 1998 I began a series of art bikes built from a collection of one-speed cruiser bicycles, mostly from the 30’s and 40’s. Most recently, with the collaboration of some musical friends, I’ve branched out into the music world and have written and recorded 4 studio albums as Jumbo Train.