Perhaps I was doomed to eventually be an artist.  My mother was a talented painter who dragged my 6-year-old body to every museum in the Naples, Rome, Florence, and pretty much all over Italy. She pointed out colors, hues and technique.  My father, an avid art collector, was continually bringing me to auctions where he would share his knowledge of art history.  And my grandfather was a nationally renowned goldsmith. I remember standing mesmerized while watching him transform an unremarkable lump of metal, which now I know it to be gold, into an exquisite piece of jewelry.

My own artistic journey has not been a straight line. I began working in photography where I was forced to consider composition, light, and lines all while wanting to look at things differently – what if I stood on a chair and shot from the top down? What if I lay down on the ground instead? How does the geometry of a flower fit with the Fibonacci spiral?

In time, my innate and extreme geekiness brought computer enhancement to my photographs -- but that still was not enough.  Images alone, no matter how exciting, felt like incomplete thoughts.  I found myself wanting to give my images context and substance, while enhancing their emotional impact.

Simultaneously, I was exploring how to express the concept of “second chances”, as well as the possibility of using non-traditional materials as an art form.  How better to express a belief in second chances than by giving new life to items that have been abandoned or thrown away? Who says that a piece of drywall, or cement cannot be transformed into something beautiful; and what is beauty anyway?

I found myself repurposing construction materials to create frames that completed the story and complemented the vision for each of my photographs.

…And almost without realizing it, I transitioned to working as a mixed media artist, where I discovered the symbiotic relationship between the frame and the photograph: “The frame does not exist without the image.  The image does not exist without the frame.  They are one.”