Mike check

Mic ro phone testing. One. Two. Three.

Ok.

So I think I might have finally figured out how to use my blog, website home page, and newsletter. But no promises, and damn it, still no emojis. Wix I hate you for this.

[Wait a minute... the right click + add emoji seems to be working now. But that could very well change as soon as I publish, as they've disappeared in the past. We shall see 🥸]

Pretty sure the blog (this place where I'm posting words and pictures) will be kind of like what my instagram used to be. Regular posts of pictures with some words. Probably longer than a caption, but not a novel. There will probably even be multiple images. The newsletter will no longer be weekly, but sent out for events or new art drops. It will be informational, not narrative. The website homepage will be updated with featured projects. Like, case study, in depth pieces.

So, basically, if you liked following my Instagram, follow the blog. If you are sick of my newsletters, rest assured I won't send too many out. They'll be more like the rest of the unsolicited marketing you typically get in your inbox (Hooray!). And the website homepage is more for people new to my work, to help them get acclimated with what I do (but feel free to deep dive into those projects). Blog is for the those who want the process stuff, and to read my terrible writing. The shop is also getting technologi-fied.

Remember the virtual gallery? Well, that is where I will hang my new work and offer it for sale. Should start testing here soon. But that's a newsletter bit of info (see.... I'm starting to get the buckets of stuffs), so look out for more info on that in your email in the next week or two.

Now to talk about the painting you probably forgot about, because there were too many words until now. But the lead photo was made using this thingie.

It's one of those old school projectors that is most likely a foreign piece of tech to Gen Zers. But it's a light bulb, with a mirror, some glass and a fan that was used by educators everywhere to display information in a larger format so everyone in the class could see.

I'm not sure why I'm explaining a projector. Everyone knows what a damn projector is.

I just really like the idea of using one in the context of my work. Using a tool that is used in education to enlarge small text or images so many people can see them. The beauty of these machines is that they could project things printed on different transparencies, or you could write/draw on them to add addition information.

The more murals I painted, the more my style of painting evolved. My murals in 2021 were made in a way to emulate my single brush stroke over a larger surface. But as I continued to make murals, the way in which I painted them started to change. There were marks I had to retrace to produce a better looking line, and it began to happen more and more.

With larger projects I brought on an assistant, and that's when everything really changed. All the lines had to have a consistent opaqueness, and couldn't be brush strokey if that makes sense. But as I started to "fix" the lines more, I obsessed over the wall and had such a hard time walking away from it.

The way in which I painted murals and how I live painted (for events and auctions) were much different than how I painted in my studio, and I hated that. I felt like my work was becoming disingenuous.

As you might know, authenticity and integrity are very important to me. I want to become my best self, to be an honest, good person, and I'm a perfectionist. The "letting go" in my practice, to make work that was "free" and collaborating with others to allow them to influence the direction of my work, was all really good for the past two years, but it's also made me realize that desire to please people is a double edged sword.

I want to make people happy, but I've done it many times at the detriment of myself. I've always thought giving is better than receiving, but if you yourself are sick or depleted, you cannot serve. So it's imperative to help yourself before you can help others.

I feel so guilty operating that way. But it's the direction I'm headed in this year. The first and most monumental step towards that was buying this house. It's for me. I'm spending a lot of time exercising, and eating healthy foods. I've been spending this time away from work and newsletters to get organized and setup here at home so that I can focus on my work.

And that now means being focused on what I want to make.

I do love collaborating, but it will be more limited, as I'm trying very hard to guard time for the things I need to make. It's scary though, because I don't know if anyone will want the stuff I'm going to make, vs. making things people want (ie: commissions) is been a very good way for me to make a living.

Geez. I'm getting lost into my keyboard right now. What was I talking about?

Murals?

Because of the murals I was painting, and the way I was painting them, my studio paintings were moving in a direction I wasn't really comfortable with. I was enamored with the energy of a line, and the connection to calligraphy in my effort to create my art with single brush strokes. But due to the large scale of mural making, this became impossible.

With each mural I painted, a certain amount of "acceptable" retracing had to happen. Eventually, this turned into retracing everything to create a consistent line. That process of fussing over the quality of the line really bothered me. I felt like I was destroying the energy of my line for the sake of "making it look nice".

So I've been thinking a lot about how to preserve the integrity of my work. I think this next phase of my practice will be about obsessing over the preservation of ephemeral lines.

This painting was made on the glass surface of an old projector I bought at a garage sale probably 15 years ago. The bulb in it still works. But making a painting, and preserving its out line, by painting the surrounding negative space is a beautiful way of preserving my organic lines without retracing them. The perfecting of the line happens by not paint them at all, but "leaving them blank".

The negative space becomes the positive space.

The original painting is gone. The memory of that line is what is preserved.

I think I'll be painting a lot in this way. It's getting me to actually paint. I suppose my previous paintings were more like drawings, that I was doing with paint. The painting around shadows in this work is like, painting stuff. Like a cabinet, or something.

I'll also be laboring over my lines which is also very new, but in a sculptural way. I guess I'll write about that tomorrow, because I said I wouldn't write novels with my pictures, but this is pretty much a book.

Earnest statements quickly become lies.

Life is so impossible to predict, even when you "[think you] know what you're doing".