People always ask me “What do you paint”? One painter asked me “What concepts are you interested in”? Another, “Are you an Impressionist”? I really hate labels. I do like being called a “wild beast” which is what they called the Fauvists. And I do use” jarring textures, color, crowded space to heighten emotional intensity” like the Expressionists. But I really think I am a Contemporary American Painter. Here is a good example of the “wild beast” aspect of my painting: Every
year we go to Sanibel Island where my painter wife Mary picks up
beautiful, whole, perfect sea shells and lovingly categorizes them,
photographs them and takes them home with us. The poet Gerald Stern has been called “the poet of exile, ruins and redemption “laying claim to people/places/things that other people have abandoned and investing them with new value through his incandescent imagination”. I like that: that is how I paint. As a Contemporary American Painter my paintings explore human beings, places, structures and found object’s relationship to the past and the future, and incorporate the concept of life, worth, DNA, death, and now. Recently, my art was featured in Art Portfolio Magazine. The magazine includes a diverse presentation of my art. Hope you have a chance to check it out. Above painting: On a Cold Sea, Empty of Life, Mixed Media, 32" x 48" |
I pick up broken shell
fragments, sea weed, dead crabs shells, bone fragments from the sea,
Lighting Whelk casings (now there’s a miracle) and stuff that just plain
smells bad – like dead fish. I photograph it all for future reference.
That and combinations thereof is what I paint – complete with sand from
the shore in the paint.