All of my art starts with a photo.  Usually a photo of nature.  Taken anywhere.  I shoot incredible wild places and I shoot two steps from my front door.  I search out subjects around parking lots, along roadways, and in public gardens, working to capture the meticulous details of a place.  I’m successful when I’ve ferreted out those special and sometimes magical bits of nature that are mostly over-shadowed by the imposing mountains, raging waterfalls,  shopping malls, and spectacular horticultural displays that draw the eyes of most visitors to a place.

My mandala art springs from my photography.  I browse through my images daily, looking for inspiration among the intensely colored flowers, intricately branched trees, butterfly wings, vibrant garden beds, and thousands of bees that I’ve photographed over the past several years.  Once I find a subject photo, I identify a single slice with interesting detail and patterning and then copy, flip, and paste that slice 16 times to produce a mandala design.  From there, I fiddle with the exposure and contrast and replace colors to emphasize or downplay specific aspects of the original photo.  Somewhere along the way, I posterize each image, creating lightly outlined pools of color in each finished piece.  This is a meditation practice for me.  It is my hope that others also use my mandalas for meditation, finding peace in their depths.