When  asked to create a painting that captured my response to Rimsky Korsakov’s music about the Arabian Nights, I first cried. Then danced. Then painted the memories and emotional joy I felt listening to the music when I was a child, dancing around my grandfather’s living room in New York City.

I stopped dancing long enough to listen to the news.  Iraq, Egypt. Syria. Libya.  A barrage of images of revolt and turmoil.  My painting of Baghdad focuses on the delicate mosque and minaret in the square where Saddam Hussein’s statue was toppled. Oil fires burn in the distance: his retort to the American invasion.  This is an image of a part of the world that has seen conflict, glory, devastation and rebirth since the beginning of written history.

My paintings were exhibited in conjunction with the New West Symphony performances of Scheherzade at the Thousand Oaks Civic Arts Center, the Oxnard Performing Arts Center and at Barnum Hall in Santa Monica, April 29 – May 1, 2011.

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