Late last night
starting working on a study for a new painting.
Prospector
When work is slow draw a sad prospector guy on neon paper.
Exquisite Corpse
For and exquisite corpse project with the Brooklyn Art Library.
It’s been one of those days
Where you draw a little kid launching a hellfire missile from a reaper drone.
Cause and Effect
or things that would be way cooler 8’ x 8’ or painting stuff no one wants in their house since 1984.
Panel One
Cause:
this would look pretty bad if I did it on an larger scale, somewhere around 8 ft x 8 ft. Maybe if I get in to one of these residencies I’ll be able to pull it off.
This was a full pencil
When I started this 72 inch tall painting.
Couple more sketches
Blatant drug art always seemed pretty lame to me, so I’ve gone through several iterations of these preliminary drawings in my sketchbook before landed on these two. It’s definitely been an internal struggle of whether I should even make these. I went through the same thing when I was working on the AR-15 painting but it ended up turning out pretty powerful.
Whoa
Well the reaction to this painting has been pretty interesting. No one actually likes it, which is what I was actually going for. The left leaning types apparently don’t want to face the reality of guns in the context of school shootings especially when it’s to scale of a real AR-15 and the right sees it as some sort of attack on their personal freedom. The fact is America has too many guns and my biggest issue with where the gun control debate is headed, is towards the scapegoating of people with mental health issues. Blaming an already stigmatized and marginalized section of society isn’t moving forward. The Las Vegas shooter by all apperences didn’t have any “mental heath issues” before his massacre.
Oh and I have two words regarding the argument about a well armed militia: predator drone.
Bigger IS better
48” didn’t seem tall enough so I jumped up
to 60”
The upside
Of no one really caring about your work is it free’s you up to create stuff that will probably piss people off!
Freedom
Something, something
Sketchbook
I’ve always said a sketchbook is the best weapon in an artists arsenal, this is how I use mine in the planing stage
Manifesting Ideas
Or something like that.
Finishing Up
The last few pages of my Sketch Book Project before shipping it back to the Brooklyn Art Libaray! Here’s some of my favorites thus far.
Well Hello 2018
Under drawing for my first painting of 2018 - five hours deep mixing Denver from my childhood with the real celebrities.
Pretty Sure
No one actually reads these posts unless I push them to other social media sites, but is October yet?!?
Re-contextualizing
Greco-roman sculpture through selective deconstruction or ish that would look bad ass in super large scale.
Drawing Denver
Had a chance to do some drawing downtown yesterday , trying to work out some 2018 exhibition ideas. Playing around with the idea of old Denver mixed with contemporary subjects. The first one incorporates the Terminal Annex, 15th St. Viaduct, and local graffiti over the years. the Second is a mixture of a white buffalo, the old Elitch Gardens sign, and the cross street where Elitch gardens used to be. That neighborhood has gone through such a transformation I hardly recognize it anymore.
The crazy thing about Denver, all the places where artists called home have become so desirable that for the most part we've all been forced out. Rino, Navajo, and soon the Santa Fe Arts district. The city doesn't seem to care, and for the most part neither does the public until its too late. Westword recently ran an article about artists leaving mementos on the RiNO Arts District signage in memory of the arts district. The sad thing is little do they know that the Santa Fe Arts District is the one they should be worried about. It's the only cohesive, walkable Arts District in Denver that has a mix of Commercial Galleries and Co-Ops. When Spark and CORE's leases are up in the next two years and we end up disbanded or moving it will be a huge hit to the district and spell the begining of the end of what makes that part of Denver interesting. You'll still have hippy hat stores and whatever Artwork Network is, but you won't have the high quality, thought provoking work that comes out of an anchor gallery and co-op with 36 years of continual operation.