I’m often asked about how I store & stage my brushes. Since I’m a gardener, I wanted to use flowerpots to hold my brush collection. I wanted to be able to easily get the brushes into the pots so they’d stand up and not flop over. I tried a variety of pebbles, beach sand, and driveway gravel. None of them worked well. But finally, I found that aquarium gravel is smooth, so it does not hurt the fish. With a bit of a poke, I could easily get the brushes in and out of the flower posts without damaging the handles or spreading gravel all over the table. I’ve been using this system for years and it makes me happy to have the garden spirit in the studio.

On my daily walk in the garden today I saw these lemon yellow Mahonia bealei flowers. Once the flowers get fertilized and are finished blooming, the seed pods turn a lovely color of Cerulean blue. Later in the summer, when the seeds are ripe, the birds take over that part of the garden and have a bacchanal style feast with all the squawking, squeaking, singing, and cackling you could possibly imagine. It’s quite fun to happen upon their party even when you haven’t been invited.

These daily studio notes lead toward my 2026 solo exhibitions in New York City and  Poughkeepsie, NY.