My artwork and writing focus on concepts of self, memory, spirituality, belonging, and place.

 

Through the very direct interaction with paint application, color interplay, the symbolism of imagery, the exploration of depth and layering, and the pliability of language, I seek to understand something about those intangible truths that compel us as human beings: the binds that we nurture with others, the wavering reality of place, the frailty and sacredness of home, the unwavering essentialness of our original nature, the detachment of self as it moves to juxtapose with the lower world,  the movement to ascend while we are in this life, and the mysteries of the unrevealed world. 

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I was born in Beirut, Lebanon, and emigrated to the United States in 1978 at the age of nine. I graduated from Fordson High School in Dearborn, Michigan, where I studied drawing and painting under Ron Cyril and Rick Cicero. I dabbled in Architecture at Lawrence Technological University, and thereafter studied painting and poetry at Wayne State University, where I earned bachelor and master degrees in Art Education. I was fortuitous to grow, as artist and person, under many noted artists and scholars including Gordon Bugbee, M. L. Liebler, Stephen Tudor, Kathleen Rashid, Lila Kadaj, Tom Parish, Peter Williams, Tom Fitzgerald, Jim Nawara, Arthur Park, Mary Park, and Jim Brown. 

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I am a high school art teacher since the year 2000, the majority of that time served at Fordson High School. My paintings have been exhibited in a variety of galleries since the early nineties. I am active in many community arts projects, most notably as co-director of the Pockets of Perception Project (aka POP Student Design Team) since its inception.