When I was a teenager, before I knew the definition of plein air, I painted on and sold rocks while on vacation at Garner State Park. Those early years gave me the confidence to pursue a career in the arts. After college, I worked as a graphic artist and then as a muralist for 28 years. My current paintings are very diverse, since I love to experiment with different kinds of subject matter. While trying to represent my subject accurately, I typically also inject something unexpected into each painting. This could be a color, a pattern or an object. I could be painting a wall, the side of a building, or even plein air painting from the middle of a lake on a kayak. I created all the work featured this month while plein air painting in Galveston.