Artist Statement
My paintings revolve around a group of themes. a. the role of the Artist in America, b. the tragic mother, overcome by monstrous children, c. the social misfit, outcast, or mal-adjusted individual, d. the beauty and difficulty of love and relationships, e. how religion or religious ideas are played out in the mind and in society, and f. the metaphorical connections between humans and animals. I come back to these ideas time and again, but with more experience and a progressively greater understanding of painting. I list these to give a framework from which to view and understand my work.
My paintings are usually started by spreading colors on the canvas, sometimes with intent, sometimes without. Next, I begin the process of pulling forms from these colors and eventually assembling them into ideas. I slowly piece together the paintings from imagination, memory, models, photographs, and existing art. This process usually involves a great deal of painting and repainting. There is a delicate balance achieved in giving an appearance of naturalness, considering the multiple sources I employ.
Within the last year, this process has grown to include making my own paints and other artist materials from natural resources, as opposed to the more popular commercially available paints and materials. I find that by using these natural materials, my colors have much more subtlety and individual character.
A recent multipanel painting, Baltimore House Painter Falls from a Ladder, falls under the category of Artist in America paintings. It is an intense exploration of the concepts of fear, dread, boredom, and how the imagination can supersede the everyday. One may be reminded of Don Quixote, and how his imagination led him on great adventures, while in reality, he was only fighting a windmill. The paintings are framed around my experience as a house painter, and some of the things that went through my mind as I performed the laborious but brain numbing job. It is a commentary on the place of the "struggling artist" in American culture. When painting houses, one has a lot of time to think imaginatively, but very little time or energy to act accordingly. Most of the figures (versions of myself) in these paintings are cramped into boxes or other enclosing devices; a shanty town of sorts. These boxes are being invaded by illogically large arms and legs, in some cases bearing the wounds of the artist's painting tools. As a group, these panels embody very strange spatial relationships. I am painting the images and space to sometimes be close to the viewer, and sometimes appear further away, as if an omnipotent creator has come and shook the painting up, and let it fall back together willy nilly. The reason for this is that Fate, not determination or will, sometimes comes out on top, and there is nothing to be done except to accept it.
Another recent painting, Self Portrait as a Changeling explores the possibility that I have been tied down and forced to change into an owl. I am shown in the beginning stage of the transformation. The owl is seen as a mysterious symbol of wisdom, but that wisdom only comes at a price; that is, the loss of one's youth. Surely one fights against this while simultaneously accepting it.
I often try to decide my place in contemporary art. Some people are quick to pigeonhole my work as illustration, while others see my work as an important commentary on modern society and how the individual fits into it. I believe that narrative painting is a significant art form, with limitless possibility. I would call myself a Magical Realist, in the tradition of writers such as Jorge Luis Borges and painters like Paula Rego, Balthus, and Neo Rausch.