| bio - long |
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| Shortly after I was born, our family
moved from Caracas, Venezuela to the pastoral countryside of England.
Here I spent an idyllic childhood with occasional visits back to
the 'homeland' of America where we would visit family in New York
and Wyoming. These two American places of opposite extremes were
all I knew of a country of which I was a citizen. As a child I reveled
in drawing and painting, reading and riding. Rudely uprooted as
a ten year old from my British bliss, our family returned to America.
I felt myself a total stranger in this new society, not understanding
the social mores of American culture. Strange expressions such as
"rip-off" and sexual innuendos encoded in baseball lingo
baffled me, and my British accent baffled my classmates. Shedding
the accent as quickly as I could I did my best to fit in, which
never really worked.
We lived in Illinois and then Houston before I gladly escaped to Smith College in Northampton, MA where hairstyles were NOT the primary concern. Having a technical aptitude, I was majoring in engineering in order to give my artistic side a practical bent. I spent a year studying Painting at Camberwell School of Art in London, England, in order to 'get art out of my system'. The plan backfired and I switched my major from Engineering to Art, concentrating on painting and photography. During this time I made my first film with a Double 8mm camera that I had found in my Grannie's attic, to accompany an electronic music soundtrack I had composed. I won a prize for the music composition, much to the surprise of some music majors. The death of my father during my final semester at college hit me really hard. I was very sad and bitter. I spent a crime-ridden miserable restaurant-working year in New York City before landing a DAAD scholarship to study painting at the Hochschule der Künste, in Berlin, Germany. I was anxious to escape and so thrilled at the opportunity to do just that. I made a new home for myself during those years in Berlin. Amidst the cold dark grey winters I found some sort of solace and peace and I indulged in the darkness. I started photographing my contemporaries in the Berlin music and art scene, resulting in compelling portraits of these divergent individuals. I enjoyed the combination of sound and picture and I started to make super-8 film projects with intricate soundtracks. The work I created was experimental without my even knowing the term. Meanwhile I moved to Spain and was tiring of the employment limitations of being a foreigner. It was time to return to the States. Upon the advice of someone I met while living in Barcelona, I decided to attend The School of the Art Institute of Chicago to study Filmmaking, where I attained my MFA. My engineering background helped me with my understanding of the technical side of making films and I quickly became adept with the gear. Having done photography for years I was drawn to the camera and so I started shooting other people's projects for them, a practice which then blossomed into a career.I started shooting music videos in Chicago and then moved to New York to get into the Independent Feature scene. I have more than fourteen years of experience as a Director of Photography with four feature films to my credit as well as commercials, short films and documentaries. I have had the privilege to shoot in many places in America as well as overseas, including Tunisia, Finland, Turkey, Poland, Nicaragua and Botswana. I am daring in my cinematography and am unafraid to try new approaches to find an original vision. Films for which I have served as Director of Photography have screened at such festivals as: South by Southwest Film Festival, Los Angeles Film Festival, Deep Ellum Film Festival, Santa Barbara Film Festival, Raindance Film Festival London, Rotterdam International Film Festival, Calgary International Film Festival, et. al.. My own filmmaking has expanded into narrative and documentary. I strive to keep the inherent openness in my approach, both conceptually and aesthetically, from my roots in experimental filmmaking. My films have won awards at Ann Arbor Film Festival, Onion City Film Festival and Houston Worldfest, and have appeared in over 40 festivals and screenings world-wide. I continue to be fascinated and challenged by the combination of picture and sound that join to articulate a story and a journey. My photographic work has been published domestically and internationally and pieces have been commissioned and purchased by private as well as corporate collections. I decided that I would not pursue photography as a means to earn money, so it remains a purely artistic indulgence. I do it solely because it brings me pleasure to look at the world in a certain way, and then to articulate that experience in an image. I have done many things to earn a living over the years besides shooting film, including: bartender, house painter, dishwasher, seamstress, English teacher, life model, optical printer, film extra, etc. A few years back with the sharp decline in the film industry in New York, I decided to get a 'real job' and so landed a part time teaching gig at the School of Visual Arts. I like the teaching it turns out, so I got even more serious and went for proper Academia. Here I am now in Dallas, Texas, an assistant Professor at Southern Methodist University, teaching film, lighting and related classes. The cliché about teaching being rewarding is true, very much so. Students can be very inspiring and inspired and I strive to inspire them right back. My family having originated in rural Wyoming, we returned there no matter where we lived in the world. I continue to return to Wyoming, like a migratory bird, it is the place I go back to. |
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