These are sequential shots of one painting. I have 7 paintings going at the moment, and I know the way I've been posting lately has probably been a bit confusing. Hopefully this illuminates the process a bit. My goal is 20 to 25 paintings this summer, all this same size and variations of the same method. There is a lot of wet on wet technique and they are taking a long time to dry in between layers, but I am loving the depth. I hope to update the gallery on my website some time in August if I can keep up this pace.

This is for Aaron. In many ways, this series of photos is what this blog is about, process. What I love about my painting wall is that it has the human presence; that palpable evidence of touch. Believe me, I've often stood back and thought my walls were as good if not better than anything I've painted. I'm not sure what to do with that, but I offer it you now....



And one final image of a work in progress. This is actually the first painting you see in the previous post. I'm going to post some sequential shots of some work I started last night.

This year I have been undergoing what I can only describe as a crisis of faith, in terms of art. I am undergoing a period of change and one of the many questions I am asking myself is whether or not to move the studio back home. My girls are getting older, so bedtime is later in the summer as daylight clings longer. With the Fall, my wife returns to work and several nights a week rehearsing, which always reduces my studio time somewhat. I'll say it outright, I'm hard on myself. I expect a high level of output when it comes to painting, and I get discouraged when I cannot meet my expectations.

I spent a lot of time during this recent vacation reflecting on what is the best course of action for my art, my family and my soul. Again and again, I feel the pull toward building a studio at the house. I find myself wanting to be near, and drawing strength from my family. Perhaps it is partially because of the ongoing recession, but I feel at times that -much as I love it, the current studio is excessive. I always wanted my own warehouse studio, and now that I've had it for a few years I've realized that it is more important to own my studio than to rent it. I don't want to move again. I don't want to be subject to the whims of anyone else's finances.

We spent Thursday night in Atlanta, and walking down Peachtree with the girls I rededicated myself to getting representation there. Logistically, it is the clear choice. Professionally, it offers a market, a chance to expand into other regions with the strength of a gallery behind me (a great many of them have sister galleries in other cities), and an enticing place for secondary roots in the form of live/work or a satellite studio.

Despite ongoing accolades from friends and acquaintances, my efforts to find representation have been unsuccessful. One of the challenges of working in isolation is that I don't get the benefit of artist friends popping in the studio to give feedback about new work, nor am I able to be out "in the scene" for the gallery walks and openings each month to make the vital connections which lead to conversations with or referrals to dealers, curators and galleries. The only solutions are frequent travel, which brings with it both financial as well as logistical obstacles, or the dreaded "cold call" mailing package.

That's my scenario in a nutshell. We're rooted here, so relocation is not an option.

Through it all I continue to paint. I keep showing up for work, and perhaps that is something.

photo by Craig McDean via twistedlamb

Inspiration comes from a lot of different places, often unexpected. Fashion photography is a frequent source. What I see in this image may have nothing to do with the clothes, the model, the design or the intention of the photographer. I get texture and color and morph them intuitively into alternate forms and rework the composition. They get filed in my mind and resurface as something from my own world.

So something like this becomes a shorthand. I use technology sometimes to manipulate pictorial elements, but often I go through this process mentally without executing a study. I always learn something with each painting. Even with digital manipulation, something often occurs to me, which I previously had not realized.

Ran away to one of SC's barrier islands Thursday afternoon. Now back and ready to get to work before we travel again this weekend. Thunderstorms, John Lee Hooker and a few paintings in progress await my return this evening.

Hunting Beach, SC

"Whenever I find myself growing grim about the mouth; whenever it is a damp, drizzly November in my soul; whenever I find myself involuntarily pausing before coffin warehouses, and bringing up the rear of every funeral I meet; and especially whenever my hypos get such an upper hand of me, that it requires a strong moral principle to prevent me from deliberately stepping into the street, and methodically knocking people's hats off - then, I account it high time to get to sea as soon as I can."

-Moby Dick

I stretched a canvas the other night, once again enjoying the handling of rabbit skin glue; the purity, the classicism. Just lost in technique and giving over to the body's memory. I flick the near-dry surface and it hums like a drum tone, I love bringing them to life from all these raw materials: wood, cotton, labor. I'm experimenting with pigment in the ground this time out, -something I have not played with before.

I work in exile, far away from friends and acquaintances in the cities. Far away from the scenes I follow online through an array of blogs, social media, phone calls and emails. The alchemist/mystic alone in a warehouse in bumfuck nowhere, activating these surfaces and exploring the depths...always alone.

A small sale, and with it a glimmer of hope and some continuance financially. The studio hangs in uncertainty as to next year. I may act, I may be acted upon, such is life. Nothing matters but the work now, there are no distractions: positive or negative. Go deeper, further. Go to the end of the world and look over and breathe in, then bring it back.

Reading Jung's writings and looking at his paintings in the Red Book, and realizing the wonder that people feel toward artists. It's easy to forget, it's just life. Jung tried to go into it and remain aware and convey the experience. It gets all hung up on the Mind, the Intellect and the other obstacles of creativity. This work is not for his colleagues, it is for us, -the artists, to explore and play with and respond to. That it should surface now, at this moment in culture and art is important.