Award-winning and internationally distributed painter and illustrator with an incredible entry into the art world—participating in thirty-eight exhibits during first thirty-eight months as a fine artist.

In 1990 I submitted two paintings for a juried art exhibit at the Detroit Artist’s Market. They were both accepted! That was the beginning of my art career. It had been a very long time coming, as I believed I was always an artist. However, I came from a very humble background and was told I couldn’t survive that way. I believed the naysayers…until I was 43 years old.

My life was a struggle beginning in my high school years. I had to take care of my four younger sisters because my single Mother worked evenings to support us. My grades were failing because of my responsibilities plus we had no car or disposable income, so we couldn’t do anything without depending on others. I dropped out of school in the middle of my junior year. It was a difficult time. Five days after turning seventeen I enlisted in the U.S. Navy and went to Great Lakes Naval Training Command for boot camp. I ultimately served my country for seven years, including two tours in the combat zone. The first tour was as a radio operator and reconnaissance photographer flying in P3 Orion anti-submarine patrol planes over the Gulf of Tonkin, which instilled in me a lifelong love of photography. The second tour was aboard the USS America, at that time the largest ship in the world. I worked 8 hours on, and 8 hours off around the clock in the message center. It was an incredibly exhausting job in an insanely intense work environment. Ultimately, I traveled around the globe two and a half times, living in and visiting 15 different countries by the time I was 20 years old. My last duty station was in Key West, Florida. It was hippie heaven in 1968, and, when I got out of the Navy in 1971, I hung around another year to take advantage of my first unrestricted freedom in my young life.

The varied experiences molded my young mind and created strong social awareness. I returned to Michigan in January 1972, a world traveler who had lived a lifetime of experiences only 24 years of age. I had started doing some sketching while in the Navy, and started my first painting while in Key West. It wasn’t very good, as I used a very limited palette to copy an old black and white photo. I showed the work to the art instructor, at what was then called Florida Keys Junior College, and she liked it enough to include it in a student art exhibit at a gallery located in Mallory Square, downtown Key West. I didn’t sell the piece—I still have it!—but her encouragement was a positive note that I have carried with me all of these years. 

Returning to Michigan with its frigid winter cold was a shock to my system. In the previous eight years I had only spent a few months in the northern winter weather. I had no winter clothes and no job. I quickly realized that my budding art career was going to be put on hold. And it was until November 1990. That’s when, after having two paintings accepted into a juried art exhibit, I resigned my job as the Director of Advertising and Public Relations for a well known 48 store retail chain with my office view from the 29th floor of the Renaissance Center being downtown Windsor, Ontario, Canada, the Detroit River, Hart Plaza, the Ambassador Bridge, and the downtown Detroit skyline, to “finally” begin my art career.

My work dealt with questions. Who are we? Why are we here? I dealt with issues like the environment, Jack Kevorkian (Dr. Death) who was then on trial, the ending of Apartheid, the Oklahoma bombing, homelessness, violence and everything else that you and I should be caring about for, although the time is different, Evil never rests. The work is continually evolving, just like our world. The only thing I know that must be done regarding a ‘style’ is to continue to grow, explore and let the body of work speak for itself at the end of my life.

Most of my art is not done for beauty, but to promote thought and dialogue. If it is seen as beautiful that is an additional benefit, but in the majority of my work my goal is to stop you and make you think, to provide you with another view of something you may or may not think about at all, but certainly an image that should engage your mind beyond aesthetics.

These images are inspired by life’s events. I stated when virtually all of this work was painted—1990 through 1996—that it was from God. I wasn’t born again then, but I was in the middle of a journey that culminated in the summer of 1996 with me becoming saved and Heaven bound! I am truly thankful.

The work is that of a preacher and the images are my sermon. My studio is my pulpit. The exhibition space, no matter where it is located, is my church. I have believed that I am a tool that is evolving in creative goals that glow in cadmium reds, oranges and yellows. I am being forged to do God’s work with my art. 

Epilogue…I moved to Georgia in April 1994, continued painting and exhibiting, and returned to Michigan in August 1996. I worked with a friend in a business called FOX LABS, Inc., in exchange for room and board, No monetary compensation. In July 1997 I became half partner, changing the name to FOX LABS International, Inc., (now receiving a pay check!), and in August 1998 I purchased the company outright. I owned it until selling it in May 2022. It had the best products on the planet with worldwide sales to civilians, retailers, law enforcement, military and government agencies. It was more than a full time job.

Now I am painting again, and ready to sell originals and prints of earlier works, many of which have never been publicly exhibited. Although I sold work and did commissions when I was painting full time in the 90’s, owning a company resulting in literally saving lives and protecting folks all over the planet from harm, was something I am thankful for doing. 

We will be adding more images. Although done 30 years ago, you will find pieces like “…screaming, “Liberty!”,“Crying Toucan”, and “Promises, Promises” are, sadly, still pertinent. 

THANK  YOU, for taking the time to view my work.