Family Portraits

The successes of my portraits come not only in the execution of the painting, but also in the connection to the viewer.  When I first began exploring more unsettling characters, the eyes were the focus and always looked directly at the viewer.  They were confrontational and forced the viewer to see and analyze these characters.  Who are they?  How do they fit into the neat little boxes you have created to make sense of your world?  How do you feel in relation to this person? 

In those paintings, the eyes were the most important piece.  The eyes were the vehicles for the message.  They were the confrontation and the connection.  They were the human aspect and the entry for contemplation of the painting.

I now realize that the lack of eyes can entrance and connect with the viewer as well, but in a different way.  My other paintings forced the viewer to interact and connect.  I now find myself experimenting with new figures by painting what seem like bottomless sockets where eyes should exist.  It is interesting to find that with this characteristic, viewers actually search for that connection, even with uncomfortable subject matter, if not for anything other than morbid curiosity.  The series is called Family Portraits, but they are missing their identity.  If they eyes are the windows to the soul, then who are they?

My paintings are large-scale oil and charcoal paintings.  I enjoy the raw color of linen and often leave my paintings somewhat unfinished.  For me, once the important areas of information are given, the rest is decoration.  It is simultaneously finished and unfinished.  Excluding the eyes expands on the question of what is actually necessary in order to express my concept.

The inspiration for my entire body of work began with my fascination with Èdouard Manet.  His painting style and avant-garde subject matter changed my thought process in painting.  I am also in debt to Alice Neel and Marlene Dumas who have both mastered the art of, what I call, “finished/unfinished.”  Studying these artists has helped me find my path in my original concept and techniques, but I am fascinated with why we are the way we are and how the mind works.  It is a strange thing.  I want to tell people a story.  I want to tell people’s stories.  I will give you some information, but not everything.  Who do you think they are?

Creeper Series

My art helps me question everyday judgments and the social bubbles in which we live.  It seems that no matter where I go, I find people who are like me.  We have a magnetic attraction and form a group or “bubble.”  We then tend to see everyone outside that bubble as “other.”  I am most interested in bringing that “other” into the viewer’s space through my artwork.  However, I acknowledge that those who I consider “other” would not necessarily be so to someone else.  So even as I hope to shed light on the viewers’ judgments, I must reveal my own.

I choose these subjects because of my mother, who almost never seems to judge.  She listens to other people and wholeheartedly wants to learn who they are whether it is the doormen at the hotel, the Middle Eastern taxi driver, or the tatted-up hairdresser.  To quote a cliché, she does not “judge a book by its cover.”  Appearance is your first impression, but unfortunately, many times it is your last.  How do you know someone’s story without asking and how can you form an opinion without knowing?

I find beauty in difference.  I am very interested in creepiness.  Given people’s responses, I have often referred to my figures as “Creepers.”  The first painting in this series is On the M Train, a painting of a man with an unsettling glare and his hand in his pants.  I also have a haunting portrait of an old woman entitled Someone’s Babushka.  But not all of them are creepy.  I find the gaze to be the most important aspect of my paintings and the confrontational nature of their stance or stare.  Even in works where you cannot see the eyes, I think you can still feel them.  Most of my earlier paintings used appropriated, readymade images as reference points, but I later began using images of people I saw and photographed.  Having met these people, I feel more of a connection to the work I create.

My paintings are large-scale oil and charcoal paintings.  Some figures are more realistic and some become abstracted.  The style I paint mimics the person I am painting.  I enjoy the raw color of linen and often leave my paintings somewhat unfinished.  For me, once the important areas of information are given, the rest is decoration.  It is simultaneously finished and unfinished.  I want to tell people a story.  I want to tell people’s stories.  I will give you some information, but not everything.  Who do you think they are? 

The inspiration for my entire body of work began with my fascination with Èdouard Manet.  His painting style and avant-garde subject matter changed my thought process in painting.  I am also in debt to Alice Neel and Marlene Dumas who have both mastered the art of, what I call, “finished/unfinished.”  Studying these artists has helped me find my path in my original concept and techniques, but I am fascinated with why we are the way we are and the human brain.  It is a strange thing.  I want to tell people a story.  I want to tell people’s stories.  I will give you some information, but not everything.  Who do you think they are?

Betties

“Woman as object” is a subject that has been spoken about for centuries.  We tend to assume a male viewer.  So, when you have a female artist painting women in bondage, the images can be seen for what they are because the mask of sexism is removed.  I want to explore the physical and emotional torture we put ourselves through in the name of “beauty.”  What lengths will we go to in order to make ourselves desirable?  And are we looking to be desired by others or really searching for acceptance of self?

I see so many of us on a destructive path, searching for perfection.  We criticize others and ourselves for not living up to remarkable expectations.  We become powerless, unable to speak, and the judgments we make and that are made of us keep us from seeing beauty. 

The paintings are all oil paint and charcoal.  I tend to use a muted color palette to direct the mood of each piece.  Often times I will let the paint drip, breaking the illusion of space.  Other times I will use paint thinner to erase pieces of the painting to show impermanence and destruction.

I have used images of Bettie Page as references for most of my paintings.  I cannot ignore the connection I feel to her from a basic physical likeness that allows me to paint almost an autobiography without painting myself.  Bettie Page is also a woman who was ahead of her time and an example of someone who did not restrain herself; this brings irony to the subject.  However, I have started to use subjects other than Bettie Page but whose message is the same as the Bettie Page paintings.  I believe these images can speak to different people in different ways and that, in and of its self, is telling of whom we are as individuals.