''Your work makes me happy,'' and ''How do you do it?'' are comments I receive most often. My medium is unusual, and parts of the process are extremely unforgiving. Commitment must be total as I paint lines and color. My work consists of two layers. For the foreground, I use silk, which is translucent and absorbs pigment with a subtle iridescence. Visible through the painted silk is a background texture layer, which I create with dyes and silk screens, using asparagus, oyster mushrooms and other organic material. Being an avid traveler and scuba diver, I find inspiration in all forms of nature, from sea life to rain forests. While drawing, I work to capture my emotional memory of a visual experience, rather than a literal rendering of the scene. The result is a unique illustrative image that plays with the boundaries of reality.