I bought this odd canvas a couple of years ago not knowing exactly what I was going to paint.
I had it resting against a wall with other canvases passing it countless times through the years.
One day out of the blue, it just came to me. Probably…because i constantly hold a brush.
I’ve always been fascinated with storms and the weather. How nature can be cruel and relentless but yet, harmonious and calm the next. This is my approach to create the feel and beauty of a storm in an abstract approach.
I find it extremely hard to paint nature and landscapes. How do you improve on what Mother Nature creates. When creating this piece I used only four colors and blended the paint to create the storm. To give it a textured look, I used flexible modeling paste and slapped a palette knife into the paint and paste to produce a subtle lifting of the material.
I was born and raised Catholic. I remember early on in my childhood going to church every Saturday with my Grandma. I always have been drawn to religion and the effects it has on our culture and soul. To recreate such a meaningful and impactful piece, with only shapes and colors was truly a difficult task. How do you capture such a profound and extremely Biblical piece that has been captured by many artists time and time again? Answer…simple and pure.
One of my first attempts to paint something from nothing. The woman form has been done many times and many ways. This is my first attempt at creating an abstract painting where it only dealt with shapes and colors to create an image of the woman form. It depicts a story of a woman’s mundane life.
I remember using so many different types of brushes, colors and painters tape. I mixed my colors directly on the canvas and played around with different techniques of blending and mixing the pigments. I truly cut my teeth on this piece.
When creating this piece I was reading a lot of inspirational books and exploring different avenues in my life. I was watching T.V. and saw a medical commercial with a heart beat going across the screen. I immediately came up with this concept. I went to my Mom’s work and I asked to be hooked up to a heart machine so i could get a read out of my heart beat…I was to calm so it didn’t really register any real profound dips in my heart beat. Thankfully. So I jumped up and down to produce more movement. I knew I wanted to have an irregular look to the heart beat. As in life, nothing is regular. I wanted this piece to speak to people in such a way where it would provoke you to go after what you truly want in this life.
This piece was originally sold back in 2013 and I was able to re-acquire it after the original buyer passed away. This is probably one of the closest, self portrait paintings, I’ve created.