My father is a professor of religion and a talented amateur photographer.  When he returned from a trip to Israel during my childhood, the colors and light I saw in his slides of Jerusalem captured my imagination and my heart.  I resolved to go to the city someday -- and paint.  on-site sketch, transparent watercolor  and graphite on cold pressed whatman watercolor paper During the summer of 1989, I did so;  participating in "Parsons in Israel," a Summer Program for the Study of Art and Archeology offered by Parsons School of Art and Design in New York City in collaboration with Bezalel Academy of Art and Design in Jerusalem. I spent over a month wandering in the city, painting, drawing, photographing, listening, and writing.  The experience gave birth to what I consider my first true series of paintings. on site sketch, transparent watercolor and graphite on cold pressed whatman watercolor paper I began painting with gouache in the January of 1990 while searching for an accurate pictorial representation of the stone in Jerusalem.  The heavy, physical paint layers and creamy, chalky paint texture of this opaque watercolor fit Jerusalem well.  Among the works painted with gouache are The Golden Gate, Inside the Old City Walls, and Outside the Citadel.          on site sketch, transparent watercolor and gouache  on whatman watercolor paper As a living, pulsing city whose history is layered with multifaceted, often half-hidden webs of traditions, ideals, longings, and dreams,  Jerusalem is an ideal subject for my paintings.  In the light and dust, the foreboding semi-empty streets echo phantom shadows of past Jerusalems, often feeling as tangible as the legendary golden stone itself.

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