After a career in real estate administration lasting most of my adult life I decided it was time to undertake a new challenge and fulfil a lingering need for further education.

In 2010 I enrolled in the Open Foundation program at Newcastle University and soon discovered that not only did I enjoy studying my chosen subjects of Linguistics and Australian History, I was able to achieve excellent results.

The marks I achieved in Open Foundation inspired me to seek a degree in Natural History Illustration, which sadly, is no longer available. The degree was extremely challenging and moved at a fast pace covering a wide variety of both art and science subjects.

Natural History Illustration proved to be a good fit for me because I was able to spend time in our bushland habitats researching, drawing and painting our wonderful native flora and fauna. In the final year of my degree, and also during my Honours year, I chose to concentrate my research and artwork on the Native Terrestrial Orchids of the Hunter Region Botanic Gardens.

My watercolour paintings are a result of my constant search for orchids, because I am constantly looking at the forest floor. Fragments of trees, leaves and their flowers, in various stages of decomposition become my inspiration, and subsequently live on in my paintings.