"Art washes away from the soul the dust of everyday life."
- Pablo Picasso.
To me, the power of Art is not contained within an object, but in the emotions that object provokes within us. Emotions that, as Picasso said, wash away the dust of everyday life. It is no wonder why we seek art, and why we feel the need to create it.
The gift to turn raw materials, like oil paints or a tub of clay, into a meaningful object, is to me, the most fascinating aspect of being an artist.
Contrary to what you may believe, the birth of my creative ideas does not take place in my studio, but in the valleys and towns of canton Ticino, Switzerland. With a pencil, watercolors, and paper on hand, I hike my way into finding inspiration. I sketch onsite. I later transfer my work onto canvases and clay.
Sketching outdoors has been my favorite activity for many years. At 16, nothing gave me more pleasure than to sketch the round hills of the Okanagan valley (British Columbia, Canada), sitting on my car's bonnet. I could spend hours on end just doing that.
As a youngster, I wanted to be a medical illustrator, but realized, as I went on in my studies, that I enjoyed working in nature more than in the laboratories. I graduated as a zoologist from UBC (University of British Columbia), BC, Canada. I traded my sketches for inventories and worked as a biologist for many years in Canada, Chile, USA, and the United Kingdom.
It was only till I moved to Ticino that I wanted to be the creator I was when I was young. Without hesitation, I gave up my life as a spectator, and started painting once more.
Not giving up my fascination for science and human behavor, I explore through my art, along with the viewer, hedonic responses to aesthetics: the feeling of happiness when discovering beauty in something distorted or discovering beauty in an illusion of reality.
My work so far has been recognized in many countries, such as Switzerland, the UK, Canada, Luxembourg, and America.