Degrees:
M.F.A., University of Cincinnati; B.A., Thomas More University
Biography:
My mother was an English war bride. This precipitated a restlessness that prevented her from living only in America. She taught me not to be afraid to be different, never to join the pack, always to strive to explore my own interests. Most importantly, she many times told me, that I could do anything I wanted. She encouraged me to explore the world. I took art lessons from Art Academy students in the Cincinnati Art Museum.
My dad was quite comfortable in Greater Cincinnati. He was a local politician, but with the spirit of an artist. The sobering Great Depression years had taught him the practical financial lessons of life. He loved art, but just quietly, without talking much about it, did business signs for his friends. Nevertheless, he always had time to do cartoons for me, and taught me how to draw and letter. He would use pastels and paints to do portraits, read art how-to-do books, and watch a favorite artist work at his portrait booth, when we would go on summer vacation to Michigan.
As an only child, I had little reason to question this Montessori like trajectory for life. I followed each childhood interest, as they arose, but my interest in travel adventure, art, and art history grew. My parents encouraged me. I had a penchant participating in diverse and impractical experiences. At 15, I worked as a volunteer in a hospital lab. I was a member of the BSA “Air Explorers”—learning to fly aircraft an obsolete WWII Link Trainer. I liked to make things out of junk. I worked as a welder.
As I finished high school, I became certified in SCUBA diving at the local YMCA. I was always interested in “what lay beneath.”
I visited eccentric relatives many times in England. I went to school there for a year in grade school, and between high school and college made a mini grand tour of Western Europe with my mother.
I studied art and art history first at Thomas More University, and for a graduate degree at the University of Cincinnati.
I married Donna and we had two daughters and three grandchildren. I taught college level art and art history, took up professional opportunities, continued my production of sculpture, exhibitions, and attendance of the yearly College Art Association in many great museum and gallery cities.
After a dozen years teaching, I received a National Endowment for the Humanities Fellowship to study Chinese Language and Art here and In China. This led to my own expansion of travel, study, and oversight of abroad opportunities for students. I was selected to work with a London University to exchange students.
I never was sure how this all fit together at the time. Somehow it did.
My early substitute teaching art to high school girls at LaSalette Academy, led to teaching eight to eighteen-year-old children at Baker-Hunt Foundation. This activity led to my secondary teaching of art, art history, and freshmen studies, to taking students on spring break trips to Europe, to becoming Study Abroad Director at Mount St Joseph University over a 46-year career. Professionally, this international career included: teaching several thousand students, and much scholarship: participation in nearly 60 juried, group, and solo exhibits, 20 publications, 12 commissions, and work included in 35 collections.
Today, I travel frequently with my wife Judy, who still encourages my wanderlust with her own insatiable traveling spirit.
Together, we have five daughters, and eleven grandchildren. We journey to many familiar and new places in mostly Europe, the Caribbean, and the South Pacific. Here, we visit historical sites, excavations, museums, and galleries. A staple in our yearly plan is to spend about two months each year living and learning in communities overseas. We framed this plan, while in Tahiti. The last two years, we have done this in the Greek Islands, and Sicily. This year, we are off to Spain.
All of this is visualized as context, subject and technique in my art that has always been mixed media. I am an artist. How could I do otherwise?