I am a Northern California artist. I love succulents/cacti, art/photography, tacos, and traveling.

I have always been a creative. There are artists on both sides of the family - some I have just learned about and others I have been in awe of my entire life. It was my art history professor at the junior college that really brought out my love of art. At the same time, I was dating a boy, whose father was an artist and taught art to inmates. He gave me his old slides of masterpieces and artists I had never heard of. However, I was dissuaded from becoming an art history major by family. As a compromise, I began studies for photojournalism. I was a photojournalist for 20+ years and decided it was time for a break to stay home with my daughter while she was an itty bitty. A couple years later, I went back to work full-time for the city I live in. However, I was needing a new creative passion. My earlier work was creative and always interesting. Enter alcohol inks.

I had just re-created my living room/dining space and needed something large to place over the dining room table to greet guests as they entered the house. I started scrolling through Pinterest and kept landing on these gorgeous, flowing images. I thought to myself, “I can make that.”

I stopped on my way home from work one day at our local craft store. I grabbed two inks, a pad of Yupo paper and some blending solution.

I sat there for a week, just staring at the supplies. I was so scared to start. Then one night, after a particularly rough day at work, I set up a TV tray, grabbed the supplies, took a deep breathe and just started flowing. That was it. I was hooked. Watching the ink flow across the paper stopped time and I was able to finally quiet my mind and heart. That was the end of February 2019 and I still don’t have a piece hanging in my dining room!

It has led to me creating jewelry, small pots and ornaments as well as beautiful art pieces, small and large. I have gotten into watercolors, cyanotype, natural dyeing and pigments, and even into ceramics. Again, I am a creative. I follow what my heart craves to create.

My life has been fraught with emotional and mentally hard events. From traumatic deaths, bad relationships, depression, a miscarriage and more. Art has saved me. It allows me to quiet all the thoughts and be focused. It is in those moments, I work out the emotional part of life. Pain and grief are used to create. Joy and happiness also are part of my process. Life is all of these things together.

My dream is to have an art and wellness center. It is my hope to work to make that goal. You will start to see me blending that into my socials and talking it into being.

Thank you for joining me on this journey.

Much love,

Jen