As a kid growing up in the 70’s, I had to be creative with making my own amusement as toys were not readily available. I was an incredibly resourceful broke preacher’s kid. I loved creating my own science projects to understand how things worked, memorizing procedures and supercharging my imagination, as long as I can remember. Pets, gardens, a saturation of colors, twisted sense of humor, nature and an active imagination were, and continue to be, an ever inspiring subject matter in my creations. Later, politics, sarcasm, music, and anger seeped into my art. As I worked towards my degrees in Broadcasting & Radio/TV/Film, I learned more about different cultures and injustices in the world. I attended school in London, with kids from 63 other countries. I learned more about tolerance and justice in the 6 months I attended school, than I could be learned by any extended documentary or BBC Mini Series. Attending school in London with such a variety of students opened my eyes to different viewpoints of cultures and made me realize that I need to be more open to others cultures and respect their opinions, even if I didn’t agree with them. I took a trip to Russia in 1984 during the height of the cold war and that left a lasting impression on my viewpoint of our political strife in what was really going on in the world between our 2 systems of government. My education and traveling have left strong impressions that are always stamped somewhere in the vast layers of my art. Be it drunken trips to Tijuana and feeling empathy towards the zebra spray painted burros, or having the KGB following me around Moscow, it all leaves some sort of whimsical impression in my work, somewhere.