About
Artist Statement
My work has always been narrative-based. It explored the relationships between the natural landscape and the Man-made or transplanted elements; the romanticized old vs the modern and new; the urban landscape in possible discord with its inhabitants. My aim was to create paintings that both illustrate the differences, yet allow for the possibility of harmonious coexistence.Now, my work is solely focused on human narrative in all its sorrow and heartbreak and brutality. The landscape is just background.
The hues, shapes and textures are intentional in serving the narrative. And to this end, I constantly mix the realistic with the abstract, a mostly realistic painting with some abstraction or a mostly abstract painting with some realism. I use oil paints over acrylic based mediums like crackle paste, fiber paste, etc. Sometimes I use other relevant materials like sand or paper. However my main and constant medium of choice is cold wax mixed with oil paints and oil pigments .Bio
I divide my time between California and Tel Aviv. While most of my work is created in my studio in California, both locales greatly influence my work. I grew up in Israel and came to the US for graduate school. A product of Tel Aviv University and Stanford University, I left the business world twenty years ago to focus on art. I have taken classes at different institutions and with excellent teachers (Mel Prest, Jamie Brunson, Jody Mattison, Jerry McLaughlin to name a few). My very first teacher, Edwin Salomon, is the one I credit with teaching me the all-important lesson of knowing when a painting is done when, watching me paint with abandon he yelled "Stop! YOU ARE DONE!" He scared the life out of me but the lesson was learned.