The following was posted on Ovation TV’s Internet site as preparation for a chat room critique
What is your medium and why do you use it?
Mostly oil on both canvas and board. Oil because you can mix colors and not be in a hurry to apply them. I find the time allowed by the drying time in oil allows for a wider range of color because I’m not in a rush. I love having enough time to respond to what I’ve just put on a surface without worrying about it drying in the next 10 to 20 minutes. I do not understand or really have any interest in “digital art”. I have no experience with creating or altering things digitally. I am, what we called in college, a “purist”. The process of painting as it has been done for centuries is enough to fascinate me for my lifetime.
When someone views your work what is your intended perception?
Engagement with something they may have inside of themselves that they were never fully aware of. Being predictable is much worse than being confusing.
How do you choose your subjects?
A process of elimination. It’s really as simple as getting an impression of something, turning it around in my head enough times that I get to the point of thinking, “Ya know, I’ve never seen this before.” That gets me excited.
What inspires your creation?
Embracing the idea that we are all walking around in a bit of a fog.
How do you see your work evolving in the future?
After the completion of a certain body of work I’d been focused on for about two years, I was really scared that I was done. I’d been pulling all my images from children’s art that I’d collected from my own sons, students and friends and was convinced that I was out of ideas, that I had nothing original to say or draw. Then I started working on the spiritual side of things – church and the whole nine yards - and everything started to open back up. I started seeing possibilities I had been overlooking before.
Lately I’ve taken great interest in the use of signage in folk art. There is something about proselytizing without looking into another person face or having any idea about the audience that fascinates me.
If you had to describe your life, so far, in one sentence what would it be?
I walk into a room, look up, see a door open and walk into the next room.
What came first the passion or the pain?
Pain, without a doubt. Great question, by the way.
Favorite painter?
By far, Henry Darger. Just thinking about his life and work makes my brain tickle. I just can’t get my mind around his whole, I dunno – deal. I just love that feeling. The fun is in the not knowing. Knowing is boring.
Most played CD this week?
I’ve got a bunch of Beck and Goa Trance music loaded on the ipod. The best albums ever recorded, though, are Nebraska by Bruce Springsteen and Amnesiac by Radiohead.
What do you think of the Internet?
It’s like any tool. When applied properly it can have some very important uses. The trouble lies in using it for certain things it won’t be good at, while believing it can still do the job. If we get to the point where someone believes she or he can be enjoying the Sistine Chapel for what it truly is while looking at it on a computer screen, we are all in trouble. That would go for human interaction as well. And yes, I know. We are already past that point.
If you could make one wish what would it be?
My kids could feel happy and fulfilled. That and me being rich and famous while being noted as not caring about being rich and famous. Just kidding ...sorta.
What growth would you like to see in yourself as an artist?
Who doesn’t dream of the big retrospective at MoMA, right? More realistically, I entertain myself with the notion of my pictures finding their ways onto peoples' walls and each coming to be loved by that person.
Art, for me, is about immortality. I get a kick out of the idea that something I made may end up on someone's wall and that after I'm dead that person will walk by it and smile, or just pause once in a while ...and they don't even remember where they got it or who painted it. That, to me, is a lofty goal.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TZravn3O-x4
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W08z7NvNeWw&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T01Gb5qzM6Q&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V7wX-iSiOqQ
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Z97IAc4ISA&feature=related