The botanical obsession. It’s real.

I grew up in the mountains, mostly barefoot, and always with a plant or animal or crayon/pencil/paintbrush in my hand. I was a hippie child, naked and happy. When I did wear clothes it was corduroys or corduroys. Always pastel.

The town I grew up in was small, located at the base of the Angeles National Forest. My cabin was a winding eight miles up through the canyon, with a creek running through our backyard, no neighbors that we could see, and plenty of dirt, plants, and dogs.

I used to take the peppercorns from the tree by my bedroom window and stir them up in a pot along with the fallen carob bean pods from the giant tree in the middle of the yard to make soup.

My little brother caught lizards with nooses made of long strands of pampas grass. Then he let them go. It didn’t hurt them - maybe just stunned them a little until the let them jet back off into the brush.

We were wild children. And also very bored. Lots of time to dig in the dirt. Make mud with water and add leaves and rocks. Search for bullfrog tadpoles in the streams. Take hikes during butterfly season. Collect flowers and watch the leaves turn and fall and bloom and turn again.

So for me, botanicals are a coming home. Pure and simple.

I’ve painted them for the last fifteen years, and the style I was into back then was hyper-realism. Buttoned up, perfectly controlled - the teacher’s pet become the teacher.

But now, I’m setting myself free. Abstracting forms, colors, shapes. Painting with my eyes closed, peeking with one peeper at a time. Painting from life rather than photos, feeling the Soul of the things, the heart of the subject. Capturing more of that than what my eye thinks it sees.

I’m a flower child with a rockstar daddy, so botanicals that don’t fit into any sort of box are most definitely my jam.

Exploration is what I’m here for, friends. Thanks for joining in and having a look. I love you for it, and that’s the actual truth.