I Feel Like Writing About Art

You can't stop me. I do what I want.

The pigment has a mind of its own. It’s susceptible to gravity and microscopic peaks and valleys in the 100% cotton paper. Different hues appear randomly and chaotically producing something that has never existed before. Trying to control it is like trying to control a hurricane or a judgmental aunt. Or my kids, who will be home doing “flexible instruction” for the next two days due to the cold snap.

While they’re home, I’ll be alternating between work, making art, and crying in the shower with my clothes on.

Painting skies has been my passion lately. When I paint a sky, I don’t think of it as a sky. I paint the idea of a sky. The best part is that I don’t actually have to think about painting a sky. The mind is what sees things. It tries to make order from chaos. I can splash some ink around on a page and the mind will fill in the gaps.

I’m learning to add a bit of warmth to my skies, but I may have gone a little far with one. Maybe it’s because it’s been a frigid January here in the northeast US and I’m desperate for some warmth. Here’s a weird sky I worked on last week. I woke up the morning after and saw things I hadn’t seen before. Tell me what you see:

I won’t tell you what I saw because I’m curious about what you saw. (Today’s Rorschach test was brought to you by Carl’s Junior.)

Speaking of chaos, the way 2025 is shaping up, I plan on hiding in my art studio/office (see: garage) as much as possible. Something about painting and thinking about painting is affecting me considerably. It’s like meditation in that it gives me a place to experiment, try new color combinations, and breathe. There are times I wake up thinking about techniques or ideas for things I want to try.

Many times they don’t work out, but sometimes they do. The other day I looked at a beautiful sky I had painted and wondered what to do with it. Should I paint a landscape below it? A seascape? Another fucking tree? Oh! How about a plane on fire crashing to earth??? Sure. it’s kind of fucked up, but at least it would be interesting. Plus, I don’t know how to paint a plane, so I could learn something new. Bonus!

I’ve always loved the idea of taking ideas and mashing them together. Right now I’m fascinated by impressionistic backgrounds with something disparate in the foreground. Like, a plummeting plane during a beautiful sunset, or a crumbling, dystopian remnant of humanity in a peaceful meadow.

A good friend is dabbling in the art of watercolor along with me and we talk about it constantly. It never bores me to try and put words to things I do with a paintbrush or bottle of ink in my hands. I could probably make videos, but I don’t want to make videos. I’d rather try to describe what I’m doing.

Most times it starts with wetting a sheet of cotton paper. Then I pick an ink or a color I want to play with and splash it around on the paper. Watching it float and migrate with the elements feels like watching magic. Because I love to capture motion in my art, many times I spray it with water and tilt the page this way and that. As the paper starts to dry, the motion slows, and I can decide if I like how it looks.

Once it dries, I think about what I want the focal point to be. Sometimes it’s nothing. Other times it’s something specific. And sometimes I really don’t care because I was lost in the creation. Right beside me, there is a significant pile of art that may or may not be finished, but the goal was never to finish them. The goal was just to make them.

Sometimes I don’t have a plan and magic happens. Other times I don’t have a plan and mud happens. My failure-to-success ratio is probably 10-1, but I ALWAYS learn something.

Here are a few I’ve been working on.

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This is one that was inspired by a photo of a sunset in Europe. It’s the contrast of the colors that make you see different things. I added very little detail because I loved the colors.

It was impressionist pioneers who realized you could paint shadows in the snow using a cold blue. The land on this one looks like snow if you ask me, but I didn’t paint it that way on purpose. Once you start to see those colors as an artist, you can’t unsee them. It changes your brain.

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This one is a crappy photograph of an idea that I didn’t execute very well, but I think is worth revisiting. I like to work perspective into my art when appropriate, and I’d love to give this idea another shot. To me, the shadows aren’t dark enough and the sky is sketchy. But I think it’s a cool idea. I see it as some kind of alien oil rig life-sucker thing. It’s got more detail than most of my work, but I like it anyway.

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Here’s one I was a little looser with. I wanted to create the impression of a post-apocalyptic industrial site, and the colors did all the work for me. At first, I didn’t want the blooms to rise off the top of the towers, but then I realized I liked it.

And one of my favorites, because I can:

It only took about 10 minutes to make this one. I just sort of let it happen, and it’s still one of my favorites.

Incidentally, I’m not looking to sell my work anymore. If you’re interested in something, message me and I’ll send you one.

Now go make some art and stay warm.