A Brief Bio for a Nonlinear and Ongoing Life
Born into a working family, Len was always making things for his father’s construction business or himself. His family was religious and his youth was full of rules, restrictions and a sense of knowing the answers to all the important questions. Not fitting into the public schools because of his belief system and not fitting into the religious order b
ecause of his questions, Len spent much time alone in nature. He loved the change of seasons in New England. And he loved the variety of trees, always the trees. He spent hours watching the squirrels and birds in a little patch of woods behind his home. When not outdoors Len could be found in the local library reading about natural history. Len’s dream as a boy was to be a forest ranger and live in the woods among all those other living things. Besides being fascinating to him, they never talked back or told him what to do or who to be. Getting a secular education was not possible, so Len’s first college degree was in theology. Again, there were lots more questions than answers. The war in Vietnam disrupted any future plans for studies and consequently he did not get back to science studies until much later in life. In the intervening years, Len took up another deep interest of his, woodworking. Between 1978 and 1996 he operated his own cabinet and furniture shops. He also learned pattern making and boat building while honing his skills as a craftsman. At 48 years old Len went back to college to reclaim his boyhood dream. He ended up working with endangered species reintroduction and management. A PhD in conservation biology was earned in 2008. One of the hardest things for him about being in school was not having a shop, but eventually he and his wife bought a house with an old building that became his studio while he finished school. Not finding work related to his education, Len dove completely into the studio and became a full-time artist. His art career had begun earlier in the 1980's when he was turning bowls and selling them at shows and in galleries around the Pacific Northwest. Now it blossomed. It turned out that making art and improving his abilities to do so was the most joyful and fulfilling part of his life. A great assist on his journey came when his wife earned her BFA. Len says that he learned so much from her and her process that he too received an education in art. And finally he gave himself permission to say “I am an artist” and get on with it as a core part of his existence. Len became an artist through the circumstances of his life, compelled by a desire to express himself in visual and tactile ways. The whole thing has been non-linear, sometimes seeming all upside down and backwards. He reflects, “I kept wanting something that did not seem to want me. The result is that instead of me trying to find my passion and make it happen, I let my passion find me, which really means to do what it is in me to do.
