STORIES, ART & ILLUSTRATION

Pi-Sunyer Naturally

Artist's Statement

Nature is my inspiration

Since my earliest childhood days, the wonders and beauty of the natural world have been integral to my personal life, my professional life and my artistic expression.

Writing and illustrating publications was a part of my work at Penn State and University of Florida, where I taught in their Forestry Schools. While teaching at the Middle School level, I created hundreds of drawings, diagrams and illustrated worksheets for younger children to facilitate their understanding of science concepts and content. I journal on trips and vacations, making notes and sketching what I see around me.

Transitioning into a new career as an author/illustrator, I now apply my scientific expertise and observational skills, as well as techniques learned in my early college years as an art major, to render scientifically accurate works intended to incorporate that sense of wonder into my drawings. Most are rendered in pencil, colored pencil and pen and ink, though I am beginning to experiment with watercolor and collage. 

My smallest art works are Copy-cology © cards, games I created to teach students to identify plants and animals from different ecosystems. My largest work is a four-wall mural in The Creation Room at First Congregational Church of Montclair, New Jersey, depicting an Ecuadorian rainforest, its associated river and their inhabitants, as well as the Cosmos.

I am currently working to independently publish my first  book: a new look at an old song: Mousekin's Twelve Days of Christmas.