Born, raised and life-long resident of the city of Long Beach, New York a beautiful seaside community on the south shore of Long Island. The ocean and seashore have always been major, but not exclusive, influences in my life and my photography.

I have been an avid self-taught film and digital photographer for most of my life, with little classical schooling. I did study for a brief but very productive time with renown equestrian and travel photographer, Nina Fuller in her studios. I have also been mentored by the best local artists here in Long Beach among them Amy Cohen, Bob Shanley, Michael McLaughlin, Kathleen Regan and Susan James among others. I also have had much success in bringing my art to fruition through the guidance and encouragement of numerous artists on Digital Image Cafe, an online community of photographers from all over the world.

Philosophy

I classify my artwork into two seperate and distinct categories, photography and digital art.

We live in exciting times for photography. The transition from film to digital has produced some exquisite new artforms as well as some very interesting philosophical dilemmas. With the advent of computer darkroom technology it is now far easier to make photographic images convey whatever we want, in essence lie. I believe a photograph is a document. A captured moment meant to convey the artists message as it appeared to the artist without manipulation of the elements of the composition. Enhancement (brightness, contrast, saturation adjustments) of an image does not invalidate it as a photograph.

Digital art is the extreme manipulation of photographic imagery to produce the artists message from elements outside of the original composition and is really where there is alot of unexplored territory today. Which makes this artform so exciting.