I read this book 17 years ago – long before social media. How is it possible that things might be turning out worse than the fiction of the book? Perhaps we shouldn’t think about this too deeply and just find a funny and cute YouTube video to take our minds off things.
This Penguin Books classic edition of Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World is the perfect subject on many levels. Not only is the theme of the book relevant, but the simple graphic design of the cover with the symmetry and balance attracts me as well.
Here’s a glimpse of a recently completed painting – a Corona No.3 typewriter. I’ve used this in the past but it needed a bit more of a grand composition so I added some pencils and books.
I’m calling this one done. Finding the point of completion is always satisfying on a painting. This one is going to hang in my house for some time while I move on to the next stack of books to paint.
This painting is available as a 12 x 12 inch print. See it in my print shop → here.
These books cover a broad range of subjects – everything from art, architecture, history, philosophy, etc. Something for everyone. And even though these books come from the past, they’re still relevant.
The titles read like a poem. Or at least they do if that’s what you want. It’s not intentional on my part. It’s more serendipity.
The Big Picture / 30 x 36 / oil on canvas / 2018
Text makes you look at a painting longer. If there’s something to read, you’ll spend more time. Then you begin to draw connections between the words. You let them tell you what you want.
A General View / 24 x 24 / oil on canvas / 2018
You may also respond to the color, and the structure the books create. They are architectural. Solid and sturdy.
Books have always been one of my favourite things to paint. And I think the titles, the actual titles, say just enough. I don’t need to add anything else. They speak for themselves and are up for your own interpretation.
Sunshine and Rain / 14 x 18 / oil on canvas
Once you add text to a painting, you’ll immediately look at it differently — words transform the subject.
This is the sister painting to the baby blue Royal typewriter in a simple vignette. A red Underwood Standard Portable Typewriter to be featured in my October 2017 solo exhibition at the George Billis Gallery in New York City.
This is another painting that left me very pleased with the outcome. It’s the culmination of years of work and dedication.
This is hands down my favourite painting that I have done in the past few years. It’s a Royal Quiet De Luxe typewriter in a simple vignette. It feels good when a painting comes together in all the right places.
This will be one of 18 new paintings showing at the George Billis Gallery in New York City from the beginning of October through to the beginning of November.
This is the culmination of plenty of work and focus. I painted all throughout the summer months and a huge sense of relief and accomplishment has come over me. I have kept busy boxing up and shipping the paintings, but also stepping back from an intense period of painting and now I’m gearing up for the fall months spent following the momentum I built up this past summer.
Electric Fan & Red Books / 24 x 18 / oil on canvas / 2017
This painting is at the George Billis Gallery in New York. It’s another in a series of paintings I have been doing by revisiting my portfolio and applying a new technique to subjects I have painted in the past 17 years.
Electric Fan / 12 x 12 / acrylic on canvas / 2004
The first time I painted a fan, I had a quick technique and was finished the painting in a few hours.
I think being a young father with a 2-year-old son and a 3-month-old daughter may have had something to do with how little time I had to paint. We had also just moved in to a new house that needed major work and I had a job at a university.
I have distinct memories of feeling this crunch of getting a painting done, racing to the finish line, before my son woke up from a nap. I also painted in the evenings for several years, tired and beleaguered.
I am completely on the other side now. Teenaged kids who require no nap times and they occupy themselves marvellously. I left my job and paint full time in a house that needs no work. Goals achieved. I have the next several decades (hopefully) to paint uninterrupted.
