The biggest challenge for me is painting a person. Of course, faces and bodies are so varied and unique that I never tire of the painterly challenge, but the true energy of the work comes from the sitter's humanness. I am not interested in just copying a face, but finding this common denominator of our humanity in my sitters continues to fascinate me as an Artist.

With the human face, one wrong move and you can destroy the portrait's credibility. Getting a likeness of the sitter is nice and usually excites the sitter, but getting a strong three-dimensional head that comes off the page and engages the viewer, is the Pygmalion Myth come to life.

I want my people to be viewed in a historical context. When viewing these works, the social barometer of our time becomes apparent. I look to the old masters for inspiration but I'm not interested in making copies of them. A Dutch still life painting seems irrelevant to our time period, unless it is infused with a contemporary view. A beautifully rendered crosshatched Classical Nude is very alluring, but how does this relate to the present? The style, manner and color with which I approach my work grounds the work in our era. One should be able to view my work and say, "yes, I remember that hairstyle or clothes style."

Along with the physical pairing of time and place in the art, the viewer should be aware of the mental "Zeitgeist"— or to be more Freudian, Neo-Freudian characteristics in the portraits. The subject of my paintings are not idealized models. Instead I paint beauty from the mundane. I am always fascinated by the average person on the street. It is my job to go beyond the mere facial features to portray the soul. I want my paintings to break down the separation between art and life. I want my portraits to breathe humanity.