Bird Watching, Sonoma County

I am originally from New York, having been born there and lived in Brooklyn as a child, but I spent much of my youth in Ohio and later moved to Japan after spending a year in that country as a high school exchange student. After getting an undergraduate degree in Japanese and a master's degree in modern Japanese literature at Ohio State University, I moved back to Japan more or less permanently, living there between 1984 and 2000, mostly in Tokyo. I relocated with my family to Santa Rosa, California in 2000 and have lived here since. My parents were bird watchers. Although many of my early birding memories are unpleasant ones (my brother and I, being children, acted like children and too often scared away the birds--to the annoyance of my father), I seem to have learned something and came back to bird watching of my own volition as an adult. Today I enjoy photographing birds, in particular. When not out looking for birds, I work as a Japanese to English translator, but I am also an artist. I am self-taught and active in a range of media, including drawing, painting, printmaking, collage, and, of course, photography. I got interested in photography at the age of eight and began drawing at an earlier age. Figure drawing has been a life-long interest, and the nude has figured prominently in my photographic work as well. In the realm of abstract art, I have worked extensively as a printmaker and more recently in collage. My printmaking has included traditional methods such as etching and woodblock printing, but many of my prints use methods of my own—for example, printing from corrugated board and from found objects such as twine, bubble plastic, and paper cutouts. My work is in private collections in the US and Japan. Gallery shows of my printmaking have included one-man shows at Suikatou, in Tokyo (1995), at Suikatou again (1996), and at Mominoki Gallery, also in Tokyo (1997). My photography has been shown at The Canvas Gallery, in San Francisco (2006). Photographic works have been published in Naked, Feierabend Press, Germany (2004) and in Nudes 3: The Best of International Nude Photography, Feierabend Unique Books, Germany (2012). Collage works were included in the “Small Works Show” at Gallery 1337, in San Rafael (2013). I will be a Sonoma County Art Trails artist starting in 2014. I am also the creator of Serendipitous Art, a blog that collects examples of unintended art I find on a daily basis. Other interests include wine and winemaking and beekeeping. Full profile