Richard Diebenkorn

Richard Diebenkorn, Oil on Canvas, "Woman on Porch" 1958

One of my favourite artists from my art school days is Richard Diebenkorn. I love his colours, his broad painting strokes and the types of subjects that he paints: people and landscapes.

Matisse

Since art school, one of my all time favourite artists and greatest influences on my work is Henri Matisse. I love his colours, his subject matters and I absolutely love his style of painting. I tend to overwork my paintings and they become too tight in the brushwork. I would like my work to loosen up quite a bit.

Alice Neel

Alice Neel
One of my favourite artists who paints portraits is Alice Neel. I love her style of paintings which are loose, contain luminous colours, and I love the way she captures the expressions of the people she is painting. She was a painter of people, landscape and still life. In the 1930's she moved to Spanish Harlem. Her portraits of the 1930s embraced left wing writers, artists and trade unionists. She moved to the Upper West Side in the 1960's. This led to a series of dynamic portraits of artists, curators and gallery owners, among them Frank O'Hara, Andy Warhol and the young Robert Smithson. She also maintained her practice of painting political personalities, including black activists and supporters of the women's movement.