Life is Service Collection
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"When Bond Vacations"
24x36 | Acrylic | 2025
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"Golden Balance"
20x20 | Acrylic | 2025
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"Caribbean Dreams"
24×18 | Acrylic | 2024
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"She is Golden"
18x24 | Acrylic | 2024
up close and personal
The Inspiration…
“My love of hospitality and of the students I’ve been teaching at Cornell’s Hotel School for the last 17 years. Everyone who passes through the school is a Hotelie – someone who is passionate about helping others and who, according to E.M.Statler, one of our founding benefactors, progresses by giving others “a little more – a little better service.” I am immensely proud to be part of the Hotelie community and wanted to dedicate this series to them.”
“Pineapple is a universal symbol of hospitality, and I chose it to be a unifying presence through all the art pieces in this series.”
Pineapples were once an exotic and rare treat discovered in the New World. Those in power and of wealth would pay high prices for this hard-to-get piece of produce. Because of their scarcity, pineapples were often reserved for only special and selective occasions and guests and were sometimes even just rented to be used as decoration rather than for consumption. In order to take part in the display of this treat, common folk often chose to portray this symbol in images, sculptures, and carvings because they couldn’t afford the fruit itself. Even though the pineapple is now a widely accessible treat, it has maintained its status as a symbol of warm hospitality.
