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MAY STUDIO UPDATE: GETTING GOING AGAIN I really am not sure why all my progress ground to a halt this entire month, perhaps it was equal parts burnout and dealing with the frustrations of living hand to mouth day to day for the past four years. There's always an extremely uneasy balance between producing work and selling work, and one half of that equation is never in step with the other. The pressure to show new work, commit to timetables and develop and progress as a painter with a short deadline looming overhead is a harsh reality that I am not sure how much longer I'll be able to cope with. I've had a vast array of thoughts about my recent work over the past few weeks - I've been fortunate enough to have had a bunch of new people visit my studio recently and as I've flipped through my latest works, I've seen some things I like, and some things that bother me. I have noticed the more I show my new work to people, I have a very uneasy sense when discussing the paintings. I do appreciate a lot of aspects of my latest work, there are some great passages throughout, and I question how they relate to my earlier works. The discussions I've had with other painters and artists have run the gamut - from questioning the compression of my timetable, to color palette, to awfully flattering comments and some raised eyebrows as well. Whatever the sentiment, I can't get over a feeling of dissatisfaction right now. And then a review like this arrives. Over the past few years, I have developed tremendously as an artist. I feel comfortable painting, showing, and talking about my work. I have gotten over fears of revealing too much, and have felt emboldened by some of my painting decisions and the sheer bravado of not holding any type of job and letting the paint fly. In some odd way, perhaps, I've painted myself into a place where I've gotten proficient at a self arrived style, and the mystery and journey has become second nature. I have always consciously tried to bridge my love of paint, abstract notions of composition and color with emotion, satire and heart. I find I'm always excited by the fresh beginnings of my paintings, and as I follow them through to completion, I often have to fight that line when I am going through the motions and illustrating an idea. I continue past the initial bursts of line and color and incorporate figures in my work because I believe my painting calls for more than just a semi-abstract composition. The line between imagery and content has always been my battle, and whatever the audience sees in my work is out of my hands. In my most recent body of work, I pushed the boundaries of my style to the tightest point I have painted in years - fully realized imagery with the clearest agendas I have ever painted. Part of that comes from confidence, a cocksure ego developed from painting, and part of it has developed from my eye that has been critically tuned to the faults and excesses of the culture around me. I do believe art has the enormous potential to shock people into a new level of thinking through beauty and the sublime. I believe this is exactly what Salvadore was getting at in his review. That requires equal parts of attention and effort from the viewer and the painting to come to a mutual understanding. I do agree wholeheartedly when one gives too much on either side, the art collapses into kitsch, or the obtuse, and the equation will never hold. In this most recent work, I consciously attached definite issues to the paintings that I felt needed to be emphasized. While my underlying recurring themes of lost innocence and personal conflicts appeared in these works, I felt the work in this show didn't want to be trivialized or hidden away in an indecipherable maze. Hipster's Paradise was a direct response to my experiences of living in Austin and mirrored the fervor of SXSW. The Target Audience questions the the validity of the art world and art shows and their audiences by holding a mirror up in the gallery. I felt the lyrical nature of Ringside Revival - which mixed the fervor of the religious right with the pavlovian response of a bloodthirsty crowd at a boxing match or political rally is the absolute right thing at this moment. I felt it was important to touch on the dogmatic patriotism that is rampant in the country today in the absurdity of sending Britney Spears-like clones to support our troops in For the Boys. Yes the paintings are didactic, but there are lessons to be learned. The show was not subtle, but neither was the title, "What If We Could Get It All Back? What is it that we are fighting for? The history of painting is filled with allegory and strife. I'm not sure subtle or clever reminders are needed at this moment in time - and in some ways, painting these paintings was cathartic. I do understand Salvador's gripes about the show - formally, I have always and inexplicably used a consistent light source throughout the paintings, discounting the full range of color and power of my palette. I also am aware of art history, but don't rely on it when I am creating new work. The residue of art school rears its ugly head at the most inopportune times, and I never would have seen the Balthus reference pointed out in a million year, but I guess it was there. And so, I don't have any answers, but the twenty new paintings I just finished raised a slew of new questions, which perhaps is a big positive to come from the show. I've thought long and hard about the next steps to take - how to continue to reconcile the abstract and the concrete in my work. Last week I dreamt about starting five large new canvases, and not planning on finishing them for two years. I don't know if I'll go that route, but I know I can't stop painting anytime soon. For now, I have no solo shows planned for a while. That gives me plenty of time to continue to progress in my work.
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