jill robbins

Meet the Artist

Thoughts, Musings, & Artist's Comments

Where to begin???? Art is in the eye of the beholder . . . Is it art? What does it mean? What kind of feeling does it create? What does it make me think of? What was the artist thinking? The act of making art is for the artist, but once a piece is complete the gift is the viewers. Can art stand alone without explanation or do you want to know why, how, what it's about? If you were wondering what has informed the creator of these pieces, read on.

I'm a therapist, a psychotherapist, it's not all of who I am, but it has been my profession for the last ten years. Just in case you were wondering, my undergraduate degree is in Fine Arts, but my graduate degrees relate to education and therapy. Everyday I enter the world of other people's live, their problems, their stress, their pain and their joy. It becomes part of me and my understanding of the world.  But what got me interested in people was my experience teaching art.

Hopefully you'll find that my work is varied. It follows my interests. I get bored easily and get much more excited by the idea of staring something than the idea of finishing it. The permanence of a visual image, the option to view it, view it again, and yet again allows for a deep, rich experience for the viewer and the story and meaning begin to unfold. 

When I make art, I'm fearless. I cannot live without it because it's the only time I can't get excited at the prospect of not having any idea of what's going to happen next. I start with a basic idea; sometimes an item, sometimes a canvas. It gives me a jumping off point to conceptualize composition and color. And then the fun begins. I just put something down, join it with something else and  . . . voila, relationships are developing. One thing juxtaposed against the next. Everything new changes what existed before. No determined stopping point, relying purely on intuition for guidance. Thought escapes me while inside the process. And then I slowly step back to observe as if outside myself. Once the internal and external are aligned the piece is complete.

This is also why I don't do commissions. I can work to your size and color specifications. Your opinions with regard to style are important. But I don't know what a finished piece looks like until it's finished. Therefore I can't guarantee results. If you are willing to take a chance, you're my kind of person and I'd be happy to talk with you. Call or email anytime. 

Who I am & What I've done

Born September 1965 in Philadelphia, PA to Stephen and Debbie Morris.

Grew up in South Florida and currently resides in Boca Raton.

B.F.A., Fine Arts, Florida Atlantic University, 1989
M.S.,  Education, Nova Southeastern University, 1992
M.Ed., Mental Health Counseling, Florida Atlantic University, 1994
Ph.D., Marriage & Family Therapy, Nova Southeastern University, 1998

. . . and that's just school.

I've  been an artist throughout my life. My parents first recognized my talent and preference for abstract expressionism when she smeared the contents of my diaper on the bare walls of my bedroom (this is a diagnosable condition nowadays). Conceptual art? What's the message?

But later my interests and skills developed. By the age of 11, I had moved from abstract design, with a less than traditional medium, to more formalized study aimed at achieving realism with pencil, charcoal, pastels, oils. Throughout secondary school and college, my interest continued as did the development of my skillls, but sadly there was the pressure to support myself. Unwilling to be dependent on anyone, and too used to the comforts of being a doctor's daughter, I embarked on an educational journey that was to lead to riches.  Medicine was the first field of choice, but biology was a 8am, so that wouldn't do. Next onto advertising and marketing, now there's a way to be creative and make some dough. But the cut throat world of advertising was uncomfortable for the sensitive artist type. So what is next, retail clothing sales. Of course, that's where the big bucks are.  As you can see this pattern of thinking did not exactly pave the way for the desired goal. So, I did eventually take the leap to complete college and I followed my bliss . . . art. There, at Florida Atlantic University in Boca Raton, I studied painting, drawing, sculpture, ceramics, photography, and art history.  At the ripe old age of 19, I also met husband #1 (technically #2, but the first one doesn't count) had baby #1, and finally got a degree in Fine Arts at age 22. 

With a degree in Fine Art hot off the press, a less than satisfying marriage, and a toddler at home, I was ready to get out of the house and put the degree to work. I began teaching art to high school students at a small private school in Ft. Lauderdale. Within 3 days, I learned that the students wanted more from e than artistic techniques. They needed help. Not help in school, help in life. Serious stuff for a naive young adult. I figured it may be important to learn how to help these kids with life's problems. Eventually, daughter number two came along and I found myself happily divorced. A single-parent, art teacher, and self-appointed savior of young people led me to my next steps. If you are following, the next two degrees make sense, a master's in education, and another in mental health counseling. 

This is where my interest in people, my deep passion for understanding how people work, how people think, and how people interact, grew at exponential rates. Blessed with a unique doctoral program that encouraged "thinking out of the box," I began to see the world through new eyes. This is a gift for any artist, because art is about seeing and if you see the same thing the same way all the time, you eventually stop seeing. As an artist and a person, I continually seek to look at things in a new way. Nothing is necessarily as we see it and we construct new stories and ideas over time and with interaction. As a result, my art has changed over the years.

My current passion and interest is in joining together Elements. Things aren't as they seem, they change depending on who is viewing it and when, and they change as we change. As a participant in the artistic process, it is not just I that influences art, it is you, the viewer. How you see it makes it what it is, who you share it with, how you talk about it, and the feelings or thoughts it evokes is as an integral part of the artistic process as the idea that popped into my head before any physical image emerged. Pieces of the environment, mass media, culture, and ideas in my head merge with multiple media, which come together in an image. Then the pieces of art merge back into the environment as the viewer experiences the images. Art is evolution.