I grew up on a nice street in a tidy neighborhood and was raised by loving and conscientious parents in East Oakland, California. I knew no wants. I suffered no deprivation.

My parents put themselves through college during the Depression, when my mother received a teacher's degree at a state college, and my father became a pharmacist after studying at Cal-Berkeley. Their parents were hard working, country folk, poor in creature comforts, though rich in love. The value of believing in oneself was foundational to how I was brought up. California, specifically the Bay Area, in the 1950s was a safe environment in which to live. Priorities were set to a different scale when college tuition was one-hundred dollars a semester. In the mid to late '60s, my world-view was shaped by the peace, love, anti-war, civil rights, equal opportunity, ecology, and women’s liberation movements. I remain wedded to those values today.

Between my junior and senior years of high school I went on an around the world tour with 84 other 16-year olds and six adult leaders, put on by the Oakland YMCA. I worked in my father’s drugstore, after school and on Saturdays, at two dollars and twenty-five cents an hour for two and a half years to earn half the money. Dad backed me for the rest. I’ve never been the same since. 

I strived. I worked. And though privileged, was taught to respect the labors of the common man. My Dutch grandfather came as a carpenter to San Francisco in 1906 to rebuild the city after the earthquake and subsequent fire. “Just remember,” said my father on numerous occasions: “No one is any better than you, and you’re no better than anyone else. It’s how you act and use your talents that matter. In the end that’s all that counts.” 

I’ve made mistakes. I didn’t always fully honor this code, and yet, it was the foundational pillar of my vision, my central tent-pole to which I honed, during times of plenty, as well as when life got rough. Perseverance was how I was trained by my family and my culture. I never lost sight of my goal of wishing to be an artist. I’ve been a potter for close to 50-years, and a photomontage image creator since 2012. I’ve delved in other trades, (farm worker, carpenter, house painter, Tribal Art Dealer, water-colorist and oil painter) for brief periods, though I always returned to the craft of clay to make a living. I’ve had cancer, which was my greatest teacher in how it kicked my psyche into attempting to make a larger ‘difference’ to the worldview, than solely with my pots. At times I assumed roles of those of a leader. I believe each of us has a calling, and a responsibility to fulfill it. As I’ve aged, I would hope I’ve grown truer to mine. A citizen of the world, more than simply an American, I feel blessed to reside in Taos, New Mexico. 

After two bouts with cancer, one in 2010, one in 2011, I reset my priorities with a goal to collect photos from around the world to use as compositional elements in photomontages. Themes are varied; the power of knowledge and poetry, tolerance, psychology, and reverence for nature, as well as creativity in its many varieties. Why are we here? Is often implied as an underlying question.

We live in divisive times. Ignorance rides the tides. I would wish my work to serve as a pictorial lifeboat to counteract these roiling upheavals of social, political and climatic change. A major influence during my formative years was the book, The Family of Man, which portrayed one hundred families (mom, dad, son and daughter) standing in front of their native homes. Happy faces.

As for process, I’ll begin with a single photo, adding others till a theme arises. For the most part, a title comes after a montage is completed. When out and about, I’ll take as much interest in the shape  and color of a leaf, or flower petal, as I will a stunning landscape. I search for subjects which convey worn history. What the Japanese call wabi, sabi. Utilizing Photoshop, I ‘paint’ with photos.

Throughout my traipsing, I’ll trend towards heritage zones, though I’ve been known to switch plans on a second-class bus stop’s dime. Art, Natural History, and Ethnographic museums hold a great lure, yet dance performances, street celebrations, working-class bars and rodeos can be just as fulfilling as Spanish cathedrals or Cambodian ruins. A sense of fascination suffuses the atmosphere most days, here, now, or around the next corner. You search, you spot, you shoot a photo. The artist in me decides what’s worth saving. Wonder drives my passion. I’ve tried to stay as close to the pulse of any an indigenous society as circumstances have allowed. Into the awe, is my coda.