“Karen” painted by Greg Stone

I have always found the magic in the out of doors. Since I was a girl, I have roamed the woods for hours on my own with my dogs, walked the beach collecting treasures, and have found my greatest solace and comfort walking the woods, following streams, drinking up the ocean and bending down and pausing to see all that is there and then looking up to notice every single thing along the way.

I studied art in school as a child but never really discovered the love of oil painting until nearly a decade ago when my daughter bought me a painting class with local artist Greg Stone. I was immediately captured by the freedom and excitement of putting color on the canvas. I felt as if I had come home almost instantly. Greg had a gritty style, an outrageous sense of humor and a deep respect and reverence for all the people and places he painted. As a lifelong brilliant, renown, accomplished, sculptor and painter, I was taken in as he mentored, taught and befriended me to join him in his unwavering love for Plein Air Painting. We went with a small group of artists on painting retreats to Monhegan Island and Cape Cod annually. I go back each year on retreat to Monhegan Island to offer gratitude and honor my dear friend and teacher, who has since crossed over, to paint and paint and paint all the places he loved most where the light converges from all sides to meet the rocky coast of Maine with a brilliance that artists have been capturing for near eternity.

I have always been the kind of person that notices the vulnerabilities, the beauty, the resiliency, and the wonder of the people and places in my life.  As a psychotherapist specializing in trauma for over 33 years, I have paid close attention to people’s gifts in the face of great challenges.  I have become more in tune over the years with the strength of the human spirit and been continually honored to be a part of peoples journey towards peace, recovery and healing.  By bearing witness to the strength and beauty of the human spirit, I have found even greater solace in the beauty of the natural world.  Painting has become my retreat and my source for rejuvenation. It is where I go to find peace and spiritual renewal. Through painting, I become one with the natural world.