Review 2025
For a long time, I've meant to write an annual review of my year's work. So this will be the first. I'll look over my work and comment on my thought process in a diary format.
In 2025 I brought a lot of male energy into my paintings in the form of satyrs and young cherub boys. This is a stark development compared to the past, when I never painted male figures. I also greatly improved and developed my cloud painting, using clouds in the foreground for the first time, as a flexible and very useful compositional element.
The clouds will continue. I doubt the horny, pursuing satyrs will continue. I am trying to paint soft, positive, or melancholy mood paintings. Throwing a prominent male figure into them is like throwing an elephant into the room. It opens up a barrel of man-monkeys, and the painting is all about that energy from then forward.
So I'm not a massive fan of my mediocre male meat. I like the idea of sweet young boy angels being in Heaven, and therefore in the heavenly settings of my dream world. The boys are already morphing into sexually suggestive little rascals. They will probably find a place in my continued imagery.
With the emergence of the young boys in my imagery, my concern about public scrutiny re-ignites. I am not consciously into boys, but we are in this insane era of fascism and hysteria about all things that even hint at being 'pedo.' So I am more worried about this issue and being judged by the public. I live in a red state. So even though I live and work in isolation, I am negatively affected by our current culture and politics. I may just die alone on a pile of paintings.
The fact that dying sounds really nice and desirable, by the way, is a definite artistic asset. As for Sylvia Plath.
Emigrating from the U.S. and living the rest of my life in another country also sounds really nice and desirable. But other countries are not without major problems. I could not live and paint in Europe because of their ban on lead white for non-professionals. My panel problem is trivial compared to this sticking point. If I ever become a semi-professional artist, it will be because of lead white (and lead tin yellows), not because I got good at using titanium first.
So. I'm ambivalent at best about the men, but now I'm protesting overmuch. So who knows. I'm also increasingly ambivalent about paintings with complex meanings. "Unexpected Friend/Ally At The Shadow Transition is one such painting. The painting is about the dark, demonic feminine as an ally, i.e. in dealing with men. Take control and stop being a victim. But people will see the satyr, the penis, and the girl, and project their own mind onto the scene. And I explicitly allow these misunderstandings by giving the vague title, because it makes the painting more interesting.
It should be noted this was the year of Trump tariffs. This caused Home Depot to stop stocking my Canadian birch panels. They switched to panels made in Asia, and the panels are noticeably inferior. Poorly glued. They have a tendency to de-laminate. My most recent panel had split layers in the center of the panel at the corner.
So I had to clamp and glue this. Home Depot updated their placard in the store last year from Canada to Southeast Asia provenance for the panels, then they removed the placards completely. Now they don't show there the panels are coming from. Hm, it's like they know it's bad? I'm concerned about the quality and longevity of my panels now. I was not worried previously about the Canadian panels.
Also due to Trump tariffs, I stocked up heavily on lead white oil from Michael Harding. This has caused me to be a bit less conservative in my paint application. (I am using a bit more paint.)
What did I do well in 2025?
My paintings have evolved into a softer, more atmospheric treatment. I've somewhat succeeded in keeping mostly positive energy, and not painting overly sexual or personal subjects. But personal subjects and themes have sort of dissolved into subtext instead.
What do I want to do in 2026?
In 2026 I would like to focus on mood and decorativeness, less narrative and more aesthetics. I'd like to get back to my main inspirations, i.e. Thomas Wilmer Dewing, John Lavery, and Whistler.
I just purchased a book on Dewing, which I'm excited to read and study. I am sticking with my current wood panels for now, even though I'm worried.
Yes, I've tried other companies and products in the past. I've changed to a fine-toothed handsaw to cut the panels for now, to reduce the delamination from the cutting, and I'm being diligent about using wood glue to strengthen the edges and corners before starting work. Can we please stop voting for these grifters, liars, and isolationist idiots in politics.
Review 2024
In early 2024 I was obsessed with the Ashcan school. I was painting dark, brooding paintings. I was looking at George Bellows, Joan Sloan, Robert Henri, and The Eight.
I was obsessed as always with painting angels, but I was looking at pathos. I was interested in emphasizing the golden halos with dark, gloomy, situations. I was interested in homeless people, poor children in bread lines with halos, and people fucking in dark alleys with their halos gleaming brightly.
The best painting to emerge from this period was "With George At The Jungle." I was also still thrifting for frames during this time. So I would find a frame and paint a painting that fit into it. My home life was very toxic during this period, with toxic neighbors and the odors of drugs in the air. This may have contributed to my dark mood.
Partway through 2024, I felt like I had some spiritual upgrades. I was having major doubts. At some point I was just saying none of this matters. It's pointless. Why don't I die. Etc. I heard a voice that said 'it matters to you.'
I started painting sky paintings. I had further communication from above when painting 'When The American Angels Came.' I feel like that painting was divinely inspired in some way. I was told (by the 'voices') to 'go big' with this painting. I felt like that meant in terms of exhibiting it, getting it out there in big venues. But I haven't done that yet.
I did have the ongoing belief, i.e. from the Ash Can school, that my painting had to mean something, or be important or weighty in some way. I started painting sky paintings that were lighter and more positive energy.Not so serious.
Going into 2025, I painted 'On The Skyway' and 'Sudden Gust', and I really felt like I had reached a turning point towards lighter paintings with fashionable angels. I was letting go of the need to change the world or be a 'serious' painter, and just painting what brought me happiness and positive vibes.
Review 2023
I never fully realized this until now, but when I look back on my 'official' paintings from 2023, six of them are set in Paris, one in London, and one in Beverly Hills.
I was looking for scenes to paint by watching hundreds of hours of VLogs on Youtube, of people walking around beautiful cities. I was obsessed with fashion, luxury fashion, and especially Paris as a setting for scenes to paint.
So instead of painting angels as I do at the time of this writing, I was looking to paint fashionable young women in street settings, as earthly angels. I was watching many hours of Youtube videos on luxury handbags and tours of Chanel stores. I was watching my bitcoin holdings burgeon and dreaming of being someday wealthy.
I was also interested in time travel and death. I painted Ben Franklin in Beverly Hills, Anthony Bourdain in Paris, Marie Antoinette three times in Paris settings (only one of those paintings survives at the time of this writing), and Camille Claudel on the Seine. Among others.
I conceived and started work on a large painting featuring Audrey Hepburn and Grace Kelly in a street in Rome, but I discontinued it. I decided city street painting was just not my cup of tea. I drifted towards Ash Can school, where I could obscure the city scenes in tenebrosity (darkness.) Then I drifted away from cities completely, and also celebrities.
There are so many bad colors and diagonals in cities. It's tough. To paint cities, you should have no problem with fantastic, imaginary colorization. You have to glorify the mundane in the most extravagant human way. I don't do that well, and I don't want to.
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The end. Maybe next time.