Most recently I have become interested in using what we know about cognitive science and cognitive neuroscience in the service of more effective ways of ‘teaching’ children and adults in several domains. Teaching is seen as providing individuals with opportunities to activate what they already know, learn new ways of manipulating knowledge, and reorganize their knowledge in light of their experience. This has encouraged me to develop a program of cognitive neuroscience research in the service of science education. It also has provided me with an opportunity to relate and use my cognitive science expertise in my life long interest and work as a creative artist. My art has helped me think about my research and likewise science has inspired some of my art. It is all glorious. It is fun.

How do I approach my work? The painting in front of us becomes transformed into an image in our mind. We use what we see to elicit past experience that transforms what we see into an image that is ours and not that of the artist. The artist’s role is to help guide, just a bit, what the viewer does with our creation.

If my pictures work they must tell interesting ‘stories.’ Without saying a word aloud, my painting, cue, in the mind of the viewer, a picture that primes what we already know. Overly constraining a painting leaves the viewer bored. On the other hand, an artist must provide a discernable structure, since an overwhelming amount of uncertainty (a term that has quantitative as well as metaphorical meaning) is intolerable.

My painting should provide an experience of discovery of what we have always known. The paintings should totally involve the viewer, to the point where someone seeing my painting could imagine taking part in its creation. The painting should be capable of helping us recover knowledge that may have been stuck gathering dust in some far away corner of our mind. The subject of my paintings and the themes that are expressed in the brushstrokes, lines and forms, are meant to convey, whimsy, sadness, calm, or perhaps a new way to fly up into the sky, beyond our immediate world, to a world of our fantasies and imagination. It is a world that, unfortunately, most children leave behind when they grow up, but sometimes, as adults they can rediscover that universe of innocence and wonder.

No painting is ever complete. Obscuring the ever-changing nature of what we see destroys what is most valuable in art. On the other hand it is important and valuable in art. I don’t like to continually go back and rework my paintings. On the other hand, it is important and valuable to revisit an art theme, and thereby extract and express new insights about who we are and our view of the world."