In early March 2020, it became apparent that the COVID-19 coronavirus strain had come to the United States and in Chicago, we anxiously watched as New York City worked its way through their "spike." Illinois Governor Pritzker, Chicago's Mayor Lori Lightfoot and Evanston's Mayor Steve Hagerty began to encourage citizens to stay home, maintain social distance and begin washing hands for 20 seconds regularly.

In preparation for the quarantine or "lockdown" as it was some times called, I decided to rearrange my office and workspace to maximize its usability and comfort, knowing I would be occupying that space for long periods of the day. I cleaned out all my drawers and discarded many years of traditional graphic design tools — rapidograph pens, a compass, oversized paper clips. As I examined the beauty of these tools that had served me so well, I decided to pay homage to them by placing them in a collage, essentially immortalizing the things I had so enjoyed using in my career. The Pandemic Art Series was born. I called that piece, "Homage To A Pandemic I," found objects on wood.

Subsequently, I created another piece, all with tidbits of wood, screws, rocks, shells from my shell collection — another found object assemblage. Then I began to notice my lifelong habit of collecting rocks from every part of the world had left me with jars of rocks on shelfs, on dresser tops, in my attic. The rocks captured my imagination in my office just as they had when I picked them up from the earth.

When I exhausted my collection at home, I went in the chilly Spring weather to the Evanston beaches and began picking up driftwood and varieties of rocks of all colors. I fell in love with the things I found on the beach and they began to appear in my Pandemic Series.

I am interested in the things of the Earth, the story held inside each rock, each piece of driftwood that finds its way to the shoreline of Lake Michigan. I enjoy finding ever new ways to look at rocks and driftwood, the found objects from the beaches of Evanston, IL USA.