In 1985, my thesis took me from the tidy academic world of MIT to the muddy valley of Armero, Colombia. This pull between academy and mud still shapes my work. For the next 20 years, I worked as a project specialist, policy advisor and manager in Latin America and the Caribbean. Finding solutions to often messy challenges.
I stepped away from this work to move closer to my elderly parents. The move was also an opportunity to explore what might be meaningful in the next phase of my life. I followed interests — some longstanding like community building and travel, and others more recent. Specifically, drawing.
I made pictures on my own for a while, confounding family and friends. (My father’s response to my first drawings, “you have a PhD and you want to do what?”) But there was something engaging about putting pen to paper, not for a project report, but for the sheer experience of new thoughts and feelings. Then the inevitable question: what more could I do with drawing?
A week at ICON10 in Detroit (am I the only non-illustrator here?) sent me to the academy once again, this time to the Illustration Academy where I met thoughtful mentors and colleagues. I worked hard at skills, craft, and ideas until one day, I drew a space monkey that made my mentor laugh. Really laugh. That was the moment I went from having a dream (if only I could draw…) to going for it.
In 2022, I began researching The Constellation of Ham, an illustrated work for adults about the chimpanzee sent into space before America’s first human astronaut. The research took me to the archives of the New Mexico Museum of Space History and to Holloman Air Force Base. The project remains in the works. On one level, it’s an irresistible story about a baby chimp and the beginnings of space exploration. On another level, it is a window into an often brutal chapter in our relationships with animals and the planet. I’m in messy territory once again.
A question was put to me, “what would you call yourself if it wasn’t ‘illustrator’?” I’m still working on that one. Story teller? Maybe. But many days it feels more like a story listener. I read the news and history that interest me, sifting through the mud to find connections and truths. Finding and making visible these connections in design and in the real world excites me. It helps me to understand, and to expand my choices for what to do.
I make pictures to leave an impression—to engage directly with life and add a little meaning to a messy world. I keep an illustrated journal, draw from life, and make series that bring pictures and words together. Some start with personal questions; others respond to politics and public life. I write about my practice on my blog and am happiest following an idea wherever it leads.
I currently divide my time between Bainbridge Island in the rugged Pacific Northwest and Washington, DC, the city I adore.
