Before I started singing professionally, I was an exhibiting painter and graphic artist. Some of my paintings and drawings are done in a loose gestural way reminiscent of the surrealists’ fascination with “automatic writing.” Singing jazz is a natural extension of my approach to creativity and self-expression.   The large “Hard Edge” paintings reflect involvement with organic shapes, saturated color and strong direct emotions.  The “Ocean Series” are painted with expressionistic sensibility.  The large canvasses are a “close-up view” of the experience of being surrounded by water.  The “Collage Series” uses handmade “monoprints” which are torn and then reassembled into landscapes and stories.  These works are meditations on family and personal evolution.  Some large canvases explore the theme of “Dualities.”   This theme became significant when I started my family.  These feature references to motherhood, attachment and separation.  The tension of “2” serves to describe what goes on in life when new life takes over.  Many drawings are whimsical and represent a fanciful take on love and life.  Arranging the images as faces, dogs, and windows breaks the expected sense of foreground and background.  These drawings convey the idea of “freeing the senses” of expectation.