In 1985, my thesis took me from the tidy academic world of MIT to the muddy valley of Armero, Colombia. This contrast between academy and mud would set the pattern for my future. 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.
Ten years ago, 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.
Today, I’m working on a proposal for an illustrated book for adults that looks at the life of the famous chimpanzee, Ham. 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 period of 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 currently divide my time between Bainbridge Island in the rugged Pacific Northwest, and Washington, DC, the city I adore.
