Thorns

The desert plants surprised me two fold. Almost every desert plant is edible and all of them have thorns. Each season presents the same plant anew. It might it be the season of the year or the plants own season from new to maturity and then decay. Three of the most fascinating cacti species are represented in my drawings. Agaves come in many forms and shadings. When the leave curls to one last thorn on a already thorny leave I see it as a painted fingernail worn by an elegant, demanding lady, who is in command of her place on earth. Where as the Ocotillo cacti reminded me more of a willfull teenager. Gangly, unsightly stalks turn with little moister to well dressed fully leaved branches, topped with a feather like bloom, almost too red for its own good. The Saguara impressed me with its grandeur, with the promise of food and shelter. Almost the whole plant is edible and the harder parts were used as building material.

Forming the Circle

Paint what you like! 

This thought freed me from my painter's block. This thought of painting what I like and not what others might like was novel to me. So I painted and every painting was a new adventure. There is the ever changing water, captivating and mesmerizing. Salmon swimming to their spawning grounds completing their very own cycle of birth and death. Then the all consuming fire. Do you know how to paint fire? I don't, well I try. The fire as a sacred flame, symbolical to the eternal light, lit in circles worldwide. Evoking the super natural where the spirits meet. Fascinating are all the those aspects, where fantasies and spiritual experience meet, circle and cycle and spiral to the next level.

Oil on Canvas 20' x 16' if not specified

Prints are available

From The Hope Chest

In 2005 I went 'home' to Switzeratland and to my surprise I felt more as a tourist in a foreign country than feeling at home. I realised how much 'my home' has become my past. The paintings of the mountains of my youth are also a reflection of those times.

Oil on linen 2' x 3'

Prints are available

Petrified

To build an enviroment friendly installation I used rocks found on location. These rock people remind of the Inukshuk built by Inuit. 'Stone men' are also found in the Swiss Alps where they serve as markers to find a path through barren landscape.

Mixed media, guache on water color paper

Prints are available

This and That

Lately I have been drawing a lot. Drawing with pencil, pastels or conte. Below are some pastel drawings all about the moon inspired by my friend, who complained about the Old Devil Moon and sleepless nights.

Last fall Glennie McKirdy put the glass bug in me when I was working for her in Canmore AB. I had so much fun in her studio that I was looking for a 'glass master' in the Okanagan Valley. I found David Montpetit who took me under his wing, teaching me about glass in his studio Glassworks in Kelowna BC.