Born in London during the V1 and V2 missile bombings of WWII, I spent my formative years in a beautiful, small village outside of Prague. We made our home in my grandparent’s summer villa where my father converted the garden, in part, to grow fruits and vegetables. We kept chickens and rabbits. We gathered mushrooms, blueberries, raspberries, cranberries, and pine cones. We harvested firewood from dead trees in the nearby forests for cooking fires and to stay warm. In many ways it was idyllic. Fortuitously, the villa was classified as a family house by the Communists and we were allowed to retain it. We lived simply but well under the rather stressful circumstances of the Communist regime. Our ‘capitalist west’ connections helped us to survive and thrive.

After my college years at the University of Prague, I was drawn back to London to experience it as an adult. Then – yearning to become a United States citizen – I made Manhattan my home. It was as if I’d lived here before. Creativity and self-expression became unstoppable. Painting is my purpose, my passion. Those early years, spent in that picturesque environment with all its earthy sensations and natural beauty, continue to inspire my work. The hues, shapes, and textures I choose often resemble the colorful national costumes worn by the Czechs in years past and kept alive in numerous folk dancing groups.