I grew up in The Hague, Netherlands, and came to the United States when I was 16 years old. I came to visit my sister and her family to keep her company and to help with her infant daughter. I ended up staying in this country and getting a university education. I had been photographing since I was a teenager, and even though I earned an M.A. degree in counseling psychology, my interest stayed with photography. So when I was offered a position at the photo lab at the University of California at Santa Cruz, I decided to end my counseling career and pursue photography professionally.
My photographic career includes working as a photographer at the University of California in Santa Cruz, operating my own studio, teaching workshops, and working as a freelance photographer. For the last thirty years I have been dedicated to fine-art photography with an emphasis on the classic processes, working with large view cameras and making platinum, Van Dyke, and cyanotype prints. I am also interested in photogravure, a historical process in which a photographic print is made with an intaglio printing plate and an etching press. New materials and technologies have made it possible to make photogravure prints without having to resort to toxic chemicals and laborious methods characteristic of the historic process.
In the fall of 2014, I joined the Printmakers At The Tannery ( https://pattpress.org/ )in order to pursue my interest in photogravure printing and learn other printing techniques in the company of likeminded artists and friends.