Self Portrait - Dec. 2006
Rodrigo I. Lois
Born in Chile in 1953
Lives in Orange County, California
Profession by Training:
Professor of Molecular Biology
retired from Cal State Fullerton
Other Creative Interests:
Photography
Gardening
In January 2002 while undergoing chemotherapy I began to explore painting. First with a computer application that simulated painting. In December 2003 I grabbed my first brush. It must have been being face to face with my mortality that gave me the need to find new ways of expressing myself other than through the logical, the pragmatic and the shy-away-from-the-mysterious-or -the spiritual that my scientific upbringing molded on me.
I would likely not had gotten very far were it not that I landed by chance in Donna Hanna Chase’s watercolor class at Irvine Valley College where she showed me that the path to art was through the soul.
She made me see that one has but to look inward to reach a wealth of creativity that awaits that precious moment when a door is cracked opened to allow it, at first, to peek out timidly and if encouraged, to burst out like a fountain. 