I’ll have new work showing at the upcoming San Francisco Art Fair with the Billis Williams Gallery from April 25 – 28.
Last year, I had a few bird ‘ s-eye view paintings of typewriters at the fair, so this year, I returned with a few more.
I am now working on a very large 60-inch x 40-inch complex commission. It will take me a long time and I’m excited to share it once I’ve worked past the difficult first few layers of paint.
Last month, I visited the Los Angeles County Museum of Art and saw an exhibition that displayed numerous Dutch paintings from the 17th century. They’re always so striking with the details, and the very dark settings make the subjects emerge from the depths. So, on my return, I decided to keep experimenting with my subject and paint this Corona No.3 typewriter. My technique has always been an adapted indirect Dutch master’s style approach, but I settled on a high-key bright setting for my subjects. Sometimes, it’s nice to step out of your comfort zone and take a trip back in time. This painting is currently showing in New York City at the George Billis Gallery.
I just finished this fifth painting in my Memory: Facts and Fallacies series. It’s on the way to New York to be shown at the George Billis Gallery.
Several years ago, I painted a small series of “tsundoku” paintings. You can read about them here.
I am including a few new piles of unread books in my upcoming Los Angeles exhibition at the Billis Williams Gallery.
Now that I fully have a phone-brain and a mild dopamine-scrolling addiction, I find it more and more difficult to read books the way I used to. But I am up for the challenge and work my best to set aside time to read like it’s the olden times.
The exhibition of new paintings opens on Saturday, February 24th. I will be at the reception from 4pm–7pm that day.
These two pieces will be part of my upcoming exhibition in Los Angeles at the Billis Williams Gallery, opening on February 24th.
My last exhibition in New York involved many large paintings, so this time around, I decided to work on a slightly smaller group of canvases.
Also, the black. Let’s talk about it. Years and years ago, I regularly set my work on deep black ground. I gradually phased that out and worked exclusively on white — or near-white grounds. In the past few years, I have done smaller paintings in black; it revealed my subject in a fresh and new way. So, above is the first of a slightly larger painting of what will become a new direction for my work.
Below, we have a neutral grey approach. Another way to make the subjects pop right off of the canvas.
Everything is framed and shipped to the George Billis Gallery. As I write this, many paintings are in transit, somewhere in the middle of the continent and scheduled to arrive at the gallery in New York on Monday morning.
When the paintings are in transit, I suffer from mild anxiety. It has happened a few times when the heavy-duty packaging has arrived damaged, and I dread to think of how it happens. But 9 times out of 10, everything goes as expected.
The show goes up on the gallery walls on October 3, and the reception is on Thursday, October 5, from 6pm – 8pm.
I just completed a series of three paintings for my upcoming exhibition in New York City. Three birds-eye view typewriters.
I love painting the mechanical components of the machines.
There will always be something charming and delightful in typewriters. Each piece is 2 feet tall and three feet wide. The typewriters are all depicted as life-size. My goal with these paintings is to have a viewer almost get a sense of being able to touch and use the typewriters.
When I start each painting, it never fails that I end up slightly overwhelmed at the number of keys I’ve locked myself into painting. I once told someone that my ability to sit quietly and do something as tedious as painting 150 tiny circles and squares is probably the key to why I can paint as much as I do.
Happy to share this photo of my painting installed in a collector’s beautiful home. It is always a great feeling when you see where the paintings end up.
Where ever you are around the world, I hope your summer is off to a great start.
This painting is slated to show at the upcoming Seattle art fair at the end of July with the Billis Williams Gallery.
A number of the clocks that I have come from the Ukraine. Last year, when war broke out, I was saddened to see that the sellers I have bought from in the past had to flee their homes, their lives and livelihoods becoming uncertain. However, I kept an eye on things and was excited to see that one of my favourite clock sellers had returned to her home in Kyiv and started her business again. So I bought some clocks from her and was surprised at how fast they arrived.
This is one of the clocks I purchased, and I liked how the face incorporated Roman numerals. It’s a simple breakdown of the simple shapes. An exercise in geometry, if you will.
Like the trophy paintings I shared last week, this one also inspired a more complex composition. Featuring a series of randomly selected books. I like the poetry a group of tiles can suggest, I like the ideas that one can imagine within the pages, like a treasure waiting to be opened.
These two paintings are in New York City showing at the George Billis Gallery. Happy to report that the large one already found its way to a collector’s home before it had a chance to hit the gallery wall.