My interest in art was stimulated by my
studies of art history, philosophy, and classics. My interests in painting
were stimulated by the work of the abstract expressionists, the German
expressionists, and Mondrian. A class in early Netherlandish painting,
taught with singular intensity and wonderful intelligence by the art
historian and artist Teresa Zezzos Fulton, had a great impact on my emerging
visual sensibilities.
After receiving an M.A. in art history at
Harvard, I spent three years in Mexico City where I painted full-time and
exhibited. During these years I explored certain classic Greek mythological
themes. My interest in mythology as a visual framework for thought and
feeling was intensified by the two years I spent as a Fellow of the American
Academy in Rome, from 1967 to 1969. Dualism, metamorphosis, the
confrontation of opposites, the struggle for achievement, the ultimate
failure of an heroic effort - each of these gestures is expressed in the
myths I use. My effort is to translate these gestures into abstract visual
terms and pass their energy on to the viewer.