Imperial Beach, CA

I live in Imperial Beach, CA which is the most southwesterly city in the USA right on the border with Mexico. There is a bad sewage problem from Mexico, but it wasn’t always as bad as it is today. When we first moved here, we used to go to the beach. Now we don’t really even put toes in the water because the water conditions are always unsafe.

However the wide open spaces near the coast and around the estuary are very pretty, and there is always parking! The city itself is not as built up as other coastal areas in Southern California. We see a lot of birds in the estuary and these sightings have informed what I paint in my work.

Usually everything I feature in my paintings is an animal I have seen or think I’ve seen, or native to a particular area. Since many species have been pushed out of their native habitats I like to paint these natural areas as they should be. The titmouse above is shown in the estuary where they frequent, and I have also featured wolves and weasels in the estuary since I learned that they are native here.

I use my own photos, professional photos, my imagination and some help from photoshop to make a composition which captures an experience I had in nature.

Although I am referencing photos, I’ve never been interested in realism, so I try to make my paintings feel impressionistic, and this is to give a sense of time fleeting. The species alive today may not be here in the next generation because of climate change. My paintings are my effort to record the time we are in right now.