The Art Of Abundance
I valiantly attempted to embody the anguished suffering artist, but chronic waffling and backsliding forced me to resign myself to a life of delight, abundance, and gusto. I now devote myself to the redemptive power of pleasure, creating images that celebrate mirth, ease, exuberance, bliss, and lust. These are our birthright and, in a just and therefore peaceful world, would be available to every one of us in abundance.
My checkered past includes stints as a miserable graduate student, buoyant union organizer, fabulous faux drag queen, bona fide sex researcher, and deeply engaged college professor. I began printmaking at an early age, with sheer delight in the simplicity and productivity of the lowly potato stamp. While still in grade school I participated in the creation of my first mural: an immense and outlandish dragon whose vast mouth was the entrance to the school library. Failing to recognize this as a cautionary premonition, I abandoned all such frivolousness to become a serious student upon entry to Oberlin College and, later, Yale Graduate School. For over a decade I taught cultural studies, with an emphasis on the study of gender and sexuality, at U.C. Santa Cruz, U.C. Berkeley, and the New College (R.I.P.).