"PIPER" from "The Museum Suite" 24x30" 2009
I paint this way now. Last twenty years anyway. On the left: an imaginary portrait of me and Franz Kafka. I sobered up in 1977. Hadn't painted for 5 years. So when I started again I thought I should explore what painters did after 1949. It took another twenty years to find my way back to a kind of realism. I like the story telling and the ability to be near what I love in with pictures. Above: a painting of my Grandson Niko.
" Ya got to show the love" That's what I told a young painter friend who came by for advice. I hadn't had that thought before the moment it spilled out. But I like the thought.
I started a series of paintings about people looking at paintings. I go to museums a lot and I have begun to feel that museums are repositories of trust. I guess by that I mean that the works of art are acts of creation without any evil or sinister intent. The world outside the museum seems filled with false idols or seductive intentions. The masks of commerce, politics,
,government, religion, often have an agenda that does not feel consistent with my well being.
People in museums are curious, attentive, polite and full of wonder. So, the kind of people I love meets the the kind of art I love and the interaction becomes subject for my Museum Suite.
