The Story Behind the Painting

Before Sedona’s red rocks became my daily horizon, there were summers on the Jersey Shore. Long Beach Island (LBI) shaped my early sense of color — warm sand, weathered posts, dune grass bending in ocean wind.

When I painted Always on Vacay, I wasn’t simply recreating a shoreline. I was translating memory into light.

There’s a question I love asking collectors when they stand in front of this piece:
Are you heading to the beach or returning home?

The choice is yours.

They almost always smile and answer, “Going to the beach — who wants to go home?”

That response says everything. Always on Vacay lives in that suspended moment — just before the ocean appears, when anticipation and freedom meet.

The glowing yellow pathway leads toward the unseen shoreline, bordered by rope-lined posts and tall grasses swaying along the dunes. Above, the patterned sky ripples in blues, golds, greens, and magentas — a palette that echoes both coastal sunsets and the dramatic skies found throughout my Sedona southwest paintings.

That crossover is intentional. Just as The Dunes of Naples reflects expansive coastal calm, Serenity at Sunset holds a luminous horizon line, and La Jolla captures the rhythmic energy of the Pacific coastline, Always on Vacay bridges two chapters of my artistic life — East Coast nostalgia and Sedona radiance.

Under black light, the fluorescent acrylic pigments awaken. Hidden among the dunes are four small hearts — quiet symbols of love, laughter, and the salt-air freedom that shaped those Jersey Shore summers. Memory becomes motion. Light becomes emotion.

Available Formats & Editions

Always on Vacay is offered in the following formats:

• Original painting (when available)
  • Limited Edition Hand-Embellished Giclées (edition of 25)
  • Canvas gallery wrap giclées
  • Luminous Metal prints
  • Gift art photo plaques
  • Giclée art prints

Each Limited Edition Hand-Embellished Giclée begins as a museum-quality giclée produced at the same size as the original. It is then returned to my studio, where I enhance the surface using fluorescent acrylics — adding texture, subtle color shifts, and luminous highlights so that no two are identical.

If you didn’t know it was a print, you might believe it was an original.

The Heart of It All

Art lights up the same part of your brain as

falling in love—it’s an unforgettable feeling.

Collector’s Note

Always on Vacay represents a reflective coastal chapter within my Top Nine collection — a luminous counterpoint to my Sedona southwest paintings. It reminds collectors that home isn’t always where you stand. Sometimes, it’s where the light takes you.

My work is also featured at the Village Gallery in Sedona—a Sedona art gallery known for representing only hand-made artwork by local artists, widely regarded as the true heart of Sedona’s art community.