"I don't know Butchie instead"

This is a painting of John from Cincinnati of the star "John". He was a visitor from somewhere else. A very awkward individual. A hero. The name of this painting is taken directly from an exchange between John and his friend Butchie. Butchie did his best to try and fill John in on the common protocol of humans here on earth.
He asked John some simple questions, and always John would say "some things I know, some things I don't". Butchie gets fed up with this, and tells John not to say that anymore, just say "I don't know Butchie. instead". For the rest of the series he answers in this way to questions that he doesn't have an answer to. "I don't know Butchie instead". John had an excellent attitude for someone who didn't know what was going on most of the time, and he had superpowers! A radical character.
I felt like he was a presence that I could handle having around, and wanted to be reminded of. I like the challenge of painting faces. I like making paintings where the people are more realistic than the atmosphere surrounding them. I like pause buttons on television.

Awkwardness, it's a way of life

" This painting is about the totally
awkward communication (failed attempts at communication) that i had
with an artist named Laura. She lives down the street from me, and
we've known eachother for over two years, and we wave sometimes to
eachother. that's it. she'll tell me that she's having an art show,
and when i go, she won't even make eye contact. sometimes i'll
skate past her house, and deliberately not wave. there's like a giant
barrier between us. it fascinated me how well we don't relate to eachother, yet she makes some of the most interesting art i've seen,
and i find her really attractive. the twelve on the spaceship is a
guestimate at how many attempts i've made at breaking that barrier.
(this painting being # 12). it didn't work. we still don't speak.
it's cool. it's possible that somehow i offended her in a blackout a
couple of years ago? or maybe she just doesn't like me.
i've considered holding the painting up as kind of a sail as i skate
back and forth in front of her house. i've been advised just to
leave her alone. Someone almost bought this one, but flaked out."

That part is in quotes because it is an excerpt from an email I had sent close to two years ago to my friend Matt. I've been fascinated by the awkward relationships in my life for much longer than two years.

I am an awkward human in an extremely awkward period of my life. It's very rewarding to me. I was out tonight and felt like the spaceman in this painting again, detached floating about. What is new for me, is that I've been really attempting to make friends with all experience, to open myself to feeling all of it. I've been speaking my mind more lately as a result. It's a new freedom. This makes for very unusual conversation, and a raw quality to my interactions that is very educational to me. It's like pulling the rug out from myself, my usual grasping for comfort, and security in my usual tools for dealing with people. There's something about stepping out into the unknown that really thrills me. I have a sense that I like people more than I've been willing to show in the past, but I have a low tolerance for idle chat, and social lubricant. I would much rather deal with what is happening immediately when it's happening. When gathered in groups people often talk about what they are going to do in the future, or how their past week, day, or year has been, what about right now? If we are all just standing around waiting for someone to make a move for the door, why can't we just leave?
I was told that I was boring tonight, I guess I can be. I don't know how to relate to groups of people talking loudly. Never have, maybe in the future. Maybe not. So I told this person that I felt like he insulted me, and that isn't a good approach with me, that I feel like he likes to insult me, and I don't like it because it hurts my feelings. What an unusual conversation for me. Maybe it was good, like there is more space for me and this individual to talk about something more interesting than we have in the past. I hope so. I don't like to be thought of as aggressive, or unfriendly, or boring for that matter, but the truth is I can be all of those things at times. These are all real experiences, and I am glad to be aware of them. Maybe now I'll paint about these things rather than confused images about disconnection like the one above.

cyclops loves mermaid

This one is a story of attraction being described as love. On first sighting, with a single eye, the cyclops decides he's in love. This mermaid, the way I see it is about 1/2 second from diving back into the sea never to be seen again by the love stricken cyclops. It was sweet while it lasted for the lad, and now he'll keep gazing out to the sea for another sighting while she splashes around out there, gladly oblivious of her admirer. A sad and beautiful tale.
Truly, this was more about exploring paint techniques and exercises in color layering, and of course trying to make paint shinier.

spaceman and the birds

This painting was very popular this past fall. It was hanging in a gallery downtown in Wilmington. There were 12 other paintings in this show, and personally, I thought all twelve of them were stronger (more likely to sell) than this one. I actually had forgotten to bring it down on the day the show was to be hung.
Quick tangent; I think it's really appropriate that we "hang" paintings. It sounds like the old days in the wild west. It's like they've been on trial since the first brushstroke. "This painting tried too hard" -"hang 'em". "This painting offends me" -"hang 'em" "This painting doesn't successfully say what the artist intended" -"hang it" "This painting showed it's heart, and didn't win the girl" -"hang it"
Anyway, sorry......it's something I could go on and on with. I realize that so many artists don't put their work out there because it's scary. They don't want to stand trial in front of the public, and be declared guilty for not delivering what people want, or like.
My experience with this painting is that many people liked it, it even got to appear in the newspaper along with an interview with myself the day before the show opened, I made up flyers for this show with the spaceman's, and the birds' images on them, and still, on the night of the opening, a total of three people wandered in to take a look around.
I had showed up anticipating something more like the crowds that are seen in the movies gathered around the gallows, throwing vegetables and shouting insults. So much for expectations!
I know that art is important to other people, and there is interest in paintings, sometimes people even buy them. This is what keeps me trying to engage the public in what I prepare to be hanged.

expansion

This painting HENRY AND THE HELPERS is a story about how the super power on the right gives strength and direction to the little pink people to help Henry. As far as mark making, or paint vocabulary, I think this is my most successful painting. It hangs in my kitchen right now to remind me to keep exploring different approaches of applying paint to canvas, and when I'm done to ask the superpower for strength and direction to get out there and help people.

success

This painting was purchased by somebody who seemed to know what he liked, and why. This was a truly gratifying experience. It was pure capitalism. I liked it. He also bought another one that I believe was one of my stronger pieces. To top it all off, he insisted on writing the check out for ten dollars more than I was asking for both.

Eye of the Tiger

Sometimes it all comes together. This painting reminds me of that truth. Sometimes it all falls apart too, but I'm not going to talk about that right now. I paint almost every day now, this painting gave me a great kick in the ass when I really needed it. Impetus?
I was particularly open to the positive in all types of living experience on a car ride coming home from a road trip to see the Flaming Lips play in Baltimore. I was feeling inspired to keep this feeling alive, to somehow pass some of their electric passion for dropping peace bombs with an impactful and super loud expression of creativity for all the motherfuckers! To stand up where I live and be willing to tell everyone willing to listen that I love them, and that it's great to be alive.., and that somehow art can be more than just cool entertainment, but radical inspiration.
At that moment I didn't even consider that I'm a quiet guy who lived in a small house that wasn't visited too often, or that I didn't usually feel that strongly about anything. In fact, I was doubtful about just about everything. I had been, and still am kind of a half assed buddhist.
On that car ride I saw a cloud formation that looked like a buddha that was wearing boxing gloves. He was layed out horizontally. I went home knowing what I wanted to paint on the canvas I had waiting at home. I didn't think it through, I really didn't question my motives, I just started putting paint on canvas, and within a week, it was done, and I loved it. More amazing to me, other people loved it. A friend of mine who couldn't afford it told me it was his. He believed it was meant to be his. He even looked a little like this particular Buddha (minus the gloves). Pete was getting ready to start Chemotherapy. He felt like having this painting would help him fight.
Needless to say, he owns it now, and the last I heard he was doing much better than the doctors had expected. Now, I don't wish to take any credit for anything other than just being willing and open to inspiration in myself and others. It's just so fucking cool when doing what I like to do is useful to others.

momentum

I just realized how much I like the word momentum. So I looked it up, and found this other word that I am really impressed by. "the impetus gained by a moving object" is what my dictionary says momentum means. Okay, what does impetus mean my informative friend? "the force that makes something happen, or happen more quickly". I am able to get lost in things like this. That is why I paint, it is often like this, one discovery leading to another.
Hey, I like pink paint, I tell the painting, then I drop some wet blue sign enamel on that pink paint, and it starts dissolving into the pink. then, totally engaged in this new game of one color dissolving into another, I find something like peace, something like learning, something like childlike wonder. It is fun. I had intended to write more about this painting, the story behind it, and how my friend you see in this painting is an impetus for me and my artwork (only I didn't know the word impetus when I started this new post). I'll state the obvious, then I'm out of here. The larger image is a detail of the smaller one.

Creating art, creating business, no conflict, no compromise

In art school, 12 years ago, I did not want to ever touch a computer. I did not want to discuss the pursuit of a job. There were periods of time where I refused to utilize a ruler for measurements. I truly believed that I had to re-create the wheel. Everything original, handmade, MINE! I did not like people, rules, money, or much of what I was told was art. It seemed that the only thing I did like was making art. The challenge of starting with nothing, and hours later, something.
Right now, I have a completely different relationship with the world I am in. I earned the money to buy a computer that could do just about anything I can imagine, and much more. I pay the cable company every month so that I can stay online, and for what? Sure, I like email, and it's nice to check the weather, and bank account status in the morning before going to work, what else? I have been very slow about warming up to the idea that there are countless others out there who I can communicate with about what is most important to me. Here's what that is these days, how do I create opportunities for legitimate business through these creations that I continue to produce, and not know what to do with? Lately the answer I keep hearing is "do you have a blog?" Now I do. Now what? So I ask you blog reader, "What do I do now?"