context
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All That’s Left is a painting about global warming. A whimsical but dark painting on what could be left in the world of flora.
A modern Garden of Eden. Is it? A statement of climate change and what is happening to the earths surface. The dramatic effect on our children to come.
Athena is a portrait of a young girl in her homemade Halloween costume, embracing her character with all her imagination.
Family Ties is a portrait of a young girl. I painted this painting in an old world Family Ties goes into the past and how our presence is due to all those behind us.
A Wolf in Sheep’s Clothing is a modern day Eve.
A contemporary take on an old tale.
ALT-BLM is a portrait of a dear friend Andre Leon Talley. BLM is Black Lives Matter. Andre was very aware of being one of the first black man to become important in the fashion industry. He was so thrilled with this painting it represented all he loved. He died right before I was to send it to him.
This is a portrait of Dominique Rouvet. I painted her as Madame Rouvet, with whimsical flowers, some fictional and some real. The Lovers Eye around her neck is that of a cat. Dominique was a vet before she retired, she loves cats.
After reading Yuval Noah Harari’s ‘Sapiens’ and E.Q. Wilson’s’ ‘The Social Conquest of the Earth’, they make it clear that we created these boundaries out of necessity in order to live in large groups. It is not human nature to live in large groups without boundaries, as in countries and religions to create a commonality.
This is about the border wall that was to be constructed between the Us and Mexico. When the earth was created there were no boundaries separating ‘countries’. This is my view of the wall. Like children playing a game…
Flight is a fantasy portrait of a real two year old, off on her own adventure. As is turned out my choice of emotion was correct. This girl grew into a beautiful, brilliant child who is very sensitive and wary of things around her.
This painting was inspired by an article I heard on NPR at the start of the war on Ukraine. The journalist was interviewing a young girl about telling her amount and mother the reality of the attach on Ukraine. Her aunt and mother believed that the Ukraine had attacked Russia and Russia was merely defending itself…
She was trying to convince them it was the other way around. The journalist said that was very dangerous, since one more time being caught trying to correct this story she would go to jail. He said “You are very brave, you must be the only little girl like this.” She responded “No I’m not the only girl, there are many girls like me.”
Miss Information is a spoof on news and journalism today. It was inspired by alternative truth. There is no such thing. People are getting their information from sources where they like what they hear, not questioning what might be the real truth. Social media is a non-stop bullet train for false information. It’s hard to tell where the truth lies, these days.
Resilience is a portrait of a little girl in the time of Covid. She shows faith and confidence. Around her is the fantasy of safety dancing around her feet.
Plastic Perfection is a double portrait of two sisters. The sisters are placed in an oversized surreal world.
White Lies is a subject that is worth addressing over and over. It’s the fantasy white men have of their own superiority. This painting specifically addresses our relationship with indigenous peoples of North America. The word on the upper right is ‘white lies’ in Cherokee.
We starved them out of their land by killing massive amounts of Buffalo. We drove them out of their fertile land in the east and moved them to barren land in the west. To the Indians Christianity was a religion of deprivation where theirs was a religion of abundance.
Ellory and Larkin is on the line of a more traditional portrait but a bit more whimsical and strange.
Street Venus is a portrait of an ‘unhoused woman’.
I painted her as Venus. If you really look at people, most are beautiful, no matter their life condition.
Floating Nancy.
This painting was inspired by a friend of mine, Carl, who died of Aids in the 80’s. Today we’re accepting the LBGT community when in the 70’s and 80’s homosexuals were just finding their voice. As they found their voice with pride, it was a tragedy that so many were struck down in the prime of their lives by this horrible disease.
The Art Student is a painting about art today. A focus on our atelier roots and the contemporary. The confusion that exists if you are not true to yourself and what you represent.
The Takashi Murakami images are some of my favorite images representing contemporary art. If you look closely you will see them also carved into the right side of the frame.
The Universal Son is a painting of Jesus.
I turned the crown of thorns into what it would look like if it was in bloom. The plant was Euphorbia Milii, a flowering plant in the spurge family.