About

Statement

I have a true passion for painting. I take thought and ideas and transfer them to an interesting piece of wood. I prefer wood with surface defects: knots and chipped wood grain all add to the depth and character of my paintings. Painting on wood brings many challenges; I enjoy each encounter along the way!

Impulsive decisions often occur do to the nature of what the wood surface offers.

Painting to me is like taking a vacation, you know where you will start but you’re not always certain where you’ll finish. Color, design, texture … SURPRISE make it interesting!

Siegel

How it all started

My Journey with art started in elementary school, when I first picked up a large box of crayons. When I opened the box, I was totally fascinated with its contents. The variety of the different colored crayons in the box was truly amazing to me. From a visual standpoint I found each crayon uniquely beautiful and I derived a pleasurable mental state by just looking at each color. It wasn’t long before I realized that placing different colors next to each other created different emotional responses. That is where it all started; pure color ignited my creative fire. I did not have any idea at that point, that I would develop a passion for painting many years down the pike.

Another key ingredient to my art journey came to me naturally. I seemed to have a deep curiosity about nature and the material environment, which I found myself living in day by day. Visual observation is one of my strong suits. I definitely viewed the world from an aesthetic point of view. All this visual information I was absorbing like a sponge, initiated a ton of thought provoking questions: Why does turquoise and white look great on a 1955 Ford, but not on any year Cadilac? Why did teenage boys in the 1950’s like thin knit ties and their fathers wore fat nylon ties? Which tie really is more pleasing to the eye? Why did kids fight over which color glass they want to drink soda out of? The color of the glass seemed more important to kids than the coke. I often contemplated hundreds of these kinds of questions.

Throughout my pre-collage years, participation in athletics dominated my thoughts and occupied most of my time. During those years, I did not entertain any desire to consciously pursue any artistic endeavors or gravitate toward an art education.

That all changed in 1969!

Anyone who was around in the late sixties are well aware of the cultural, political, moral and artistic changes that were sweeping the United States. Drugs, rock music, long hair, bellbottom pants and anti-war protests dominated the popular culture of the day. From strictly a visual point of view, 1969 was off the charts. Colorful album covers and psychedelic posters covered the walls of college dorms. The décor in many restaurants and stores changed drastically. Color was everywhere. With all this visual stimuli, the creative side of my personality began to emerge. That big box of crayons that lay dormant for all those years was opened and replaced with acrylic paints.

Siegel