“Painted Tasting Notes,” Art & Wine Pairings: The Wine and Champagne muses that inspired the paintings! I see taste. When I paint, I taste flavors in the colors and when I mix colors, I taste flavors in the paint. My oil paints are like a spice rack; when I paint, it feels like I am cooking. When I taste, I imagine an array of spices and fresh ingredients at my fingertips while I visualize the nuances of color and texture that correlate. I see it all in vivid color and texture and paint it. This “mixing of the senses” is a rare form of synesthesia where I visualize flavor as color, pattern, texture and emotion. My painting process always begins with a blank canvas and a sip of wine. I begin each piece on pure white canvas to represent the linen that is typically held behind the wine glass to enhance the truest color of the wine. The elongated drips from top to bottom of the canvas simulate the legs of the wine. And with texture and pattern of my brushstrokes, I am able to communicate the mouth feel of tannins or smoothness of the wine. Color always translates to flavors like the sweetness of strawberry and plum, or acidity of lemon or tart cherry. And my finishing touch is to embed mica into the paint that acts as my signature mark and resembles minerality in the wine. My frames are always natural, unpolished wood which emulates the feeling of the wine barrel. I create every painting live, as a visual performance, during events. These action paintings suspend moments in time, tell a story and evoke memory. I am merely a conduit; a visual voice to express the emotion of flavor onto canvas.
