Self-expression is like a latent force in me and I never know when it will strike. It's often some simple random experience that will spark me creatively and I'll be moved to make something more of that inspiration. Life is transitory, and you have to move fast to catch the quick of it - those fleeting moments of beauty and power and intimacy. Heartbreak. Love. As a kid, I spent a lot of time out on the water and I think that made me more sensitive to my surroundings, more alert. But once my imagination has been seized by an idea or emotion, I close myself off in my studio and the painting becomes an intuitive process grounded in my personal experience. At least, that is where it starts off - but then every piece somehow escapes me, going beyond my personal truth to finds its own voice. As Gordon Smith - my teacher, mentor and happy warrior for art - would say:"There's a point where the painting takes on a life of its own and you work from there." I live for those points of creative liberation.