•    In 1975, while studying drawing and painting at the Art Students League and sculpture at the New School, I became dissatisfied with traditional painting and sculpture and decided I needed to portray what I was saw in a new way.  My inspiration came in part from Cezanne writing that he was trying to paint what he saw.  I began reading up on the physiology of vision at Flower 5th Avenue hospital library and was attracted to Egyptian reliefs at the Met.  I realized It might be possible to create visual illusions in a shallow three dimensional space. 
  

         
             One day I decided to do a still life of pears on a plate but had no stretched canvas available.  I took an old painting and pressed some sculpture clay into the back of the canvas, forming a tablet.   I sketched the outlines of the pears and the plate on the clay with my brush handle and then built up the pear forms with more clay.   

             For the cast shadows, I instinctively hollowed out the clay.  The light from the north windows of my 7th Street studio lit up the pears and created  real shadows in the hollows.  I was stunned by the concept of working directly with light and shadow on a relief surface.  I had fallen through two dimensions into a new realm.

​ I have since conceived of all objects as relief images.

             I have been exploring this realm ever since, marking trail with my reliefs, now numbering over 1,400 original pieces and many more editions.  I have learned a new way of seeing, and by necessity have invented new materials, easels, tools and methods of working.  After 48 years, I have barely scratched the surface. 

            

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First Relief 1975-01 Pears     Acrylic on clay  8.5"x9.5"x1"

Here are photos of my 7th Street NYC studio, my 649 Mai  Street Brewster, MA studio, my 1772 Main Street, Brewster studio, tool, materials, etc.