"True art is characterized by an irresistible urge in the creative artist."
Albert Einstein
My Work
Most of my subject matter is nature-inspired, whether it is a botanical specimen, traditional landscape, or billowy clouds in the sky. My art translates the subject into whimsically mysterious, albeit, identifiable forms. I use encaustic materials (beeswax and damar resin), pigments, shellac and a propane torch to create art on birch panels. The ancient painting medium — encaustics — was first used by Greek artists as far back as the 5th century B.C. The medium seduces me to be experimental and playful. Fire and wax dance to my music— orchestrated and serendipitous. My goal is to inspire those who see my work to look more creatively at the world around them, to discover beauty reflected in ordinary and treasured places and things in the world we all share.
Biography
I was born in Brooklyn, NY where I was first introduced to, and fell in love with art at the Brooklyn Museum. My education and the career that followed focused, however, on the life sciences and medical research. An immunologist and medical educator who trained at New York University School of Medicine and Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, I am currently Professor of Medicine and Cell Biology and Director of the Clinical and Translational Science Center at SUNY Downstate Medical Center, University of Health Sciences. Throughout my career in academic medicine, I have used much of my free time to experiment with diverse media to create art. My foray into beeswax as a medium began when I enrolled in an encaustic art workshop at the Katonah Art Museum, in Katonah, NY where I reside. The experience stimulated a new passion for an ancient art medium – beeswax. Wooden panels (I use fine-grained birch hardwood panels) and hand-made clay bowls, driftwood and other materials have become canvases for the molten wax I apply to these surfaces to create art that manifests from ideology rooted in experimentation and discovery. @Richard_Coico