Kenneth Clark emphasizes that “Flow of line is the most musical element in visual arts.” With this idea I begin a drawing that will ultimately be the foundation for a painting. Although lines are often obscured by paint, they remain the underpinning of my painting like the girders in a skyscraper. It is essential that these lines be heard as well as felt. Colored shapes hang from these lines to form structures. Meanings are established by maneuvering these elements.

          Lucy Lippard states that “Finding a place for oneself in the world is finding a place for oneself in a story.” My paintings reflect my place and story as I continue to define who I am. I grew up on the wealthy Eastern seaboard. I became acutely aware that some people think they are better than others because of superficial differences like money, class or profession. When I was twenty, the lavish parties and yacht club crowd blew away after my father died and the lifestyle we had been living evaporated. These changes developed the themes I have used in my paintings.

          Recently, I have concentrated on painting women. These paintings illustrate the situations I have encountered as a woman interacting with other women. As a child, most of the women I encountered were alcoholics with little to do but do charitable work or social scheming. They resembled the “Ladies Who Lunch” in the Sondheim song. Although I don’t always paint this class of women, the memories of my encounters with them provide mental underpaintings. Around age twelve, I was taken by rowboat to a cocktail party on a Chinese junk. The short, hefty woman who rowed the boat had a fat face framed by tousled bleached hair that kept her “sixties” flip by means of tons of lacquer. Her broad smile and puffy cheeks that dripped excessive lipstick contributed to that look of never being sober. The buttons were popping from the too small blouse and she had very fat feet forced into red spiked heels. She dwells within all the women I paint as a reference to capturing the outer bodily movement as well as the inner life of each woman I paint regardless of their age or lifestyle.

          Women express their lives in their facial expressions as well as in their clothing, makeup and jewelry. Pretension can’t be hidden by dyed hair or excessive adornment. The latest style of dress may not mean that the woman is “ to the manor born.” Too much make up or jewelry can’t hide a woman who is alone or depressed. Maybe she is unpleasant to be with or perhaps she has been widowed and is contending with a world her husband had managed. Women who are selfish or fat or worn out become intriguing. I capture their personality in paint, manipulate them and allow them to overpower the composition as they tell a story. Exaggerating their features or their body language can emphasize my point. I can also juxtapose them with other women who may have opposing traits. I paint the ambiguities I feel about being a woman myself. Class distinctions have become the driving force in my work. Women who have felt unequally treated are often nasty to others of their gender. Professional women may look down upon working class women or “stay-at-home-moms.” Women often behave more aggressively than men in the workplace because they feel that is how society expects them to get ahead. Lonely upper class women will use their servants as confidantes but would never let them be social equals.

          As a mother I often spend idle hours waiting in lines or sitting on bleachers watching children’s events. I have learned to observe women around me in order to develop new material. I spend time looking and then let the images ripen until one lingers in my mind. I have been inspired by Matisse whose colorful somewhat flat surfaces portrayed the common people and overlooked objects in his world. Alice Neel draws with paint to get under the skin into the inner psyche of her models. Capturing women in paint allows me to subjugate and explore their personalities and provides me with a better understanding of the complexities of today’s world that can be somewhat tamed and explained on canvas.