Funny enough, that early paranoia was kind of unwarranted. My brief stint as a hiring art director gave me a depressing glimpse into the sorely unoriginal world of the typical art student. I have never seen such boring and unimaginative work... full of used visual puns and borrowing heavily from blatant commercialism. And the assignments were identical from student to student and school to school. A cookie cutter way to create "art". My stuff might be self taught but at least it's original and constantly evolving...and I would like to think I will keep it that way.
This latest painting is a nod to modern impressionism. I rarely add abstract elements in my work and yet I've always liked the juxtaposition of realism and pattern. I decided that it was time to brush up on my looser, more-abstract techniques when this image burned itself into a dream the other night. I tried it out at my latest live painting. The reaction was mixed but positive. Kind of "Hell yeah!" mixed with "WTF!" I think people get a little thrown when I jump out of the box they try to fit me in. And I'm doing that a lot lately. I just don't want to get settled into a definitive style while there's so much I might want to add. Also the way this style works involves all the crazy abstract colors first before the trees... so I think people just thought I'd lost my mind and hadn't really worked out a painting until the end of the night. Then it got a lot of attention.
The best part about these ventures into alternate techniques is that, regardless where it goes, it's guaranteed to affect all my other paintings for the better. A bigger arsenal is always better. And I like it. So that's something. In fact, I like this technique so much that I'm planning a series. With so much potential, I'm excited to see how they evolve from here. And on the plus side, they're fun as hell to paint. And isn't that what it's all about?
