The tale of 07-01-2011

A nice story about a painting. This painting began it's life as a finished painting on 07-01-2011. I always name my paintings by the date I finish them on. It began life as a 36 X 30 Inch Painting. The pics in the next few entries are all part of it's life. Our story begins with the painting in my studio the day I took photos with my small cheap camera, using photoshop to balance out the colors. I could have chopped out the background and added a new one, but I don't care for fake shadows. It's a highly transparent color which you can see right into the canvas color below. I was really into what I refer to as a japanese landscape style of making the textures, I always felt it helped with such transparent colors, especially the way the color gravitates toward the bottom leaving behind veils of color that show off the natural color of the wood filler texture behind. This group of work will always be something I want to get back to in the future, I need to make a larger scaled group of these paintings. It will happen.





The first exhibition this painting was in was actually a two person private residence show...with Joseph Marioni in his private home in PA. It was actually the third show we did together, very few people got to see it in person. I've only got photos of two of the shows we did together. I drove these paintings from Columbus Ohio to his place in Pennsylvania to stay for a week. Joe usually would let me stay for an extended time, always nice to me. I would also at one time use his place as a stopover on my trips to NYC. That way I could take the bus to NYC from his place instead of driving into town. Later I just began driving in as I had found out how to park in NYC for cheap.

The photo in this entry was installed by The Painter himself. I woke up on the 2nd day and he had moved everything around in his place to accommodate my work. Very kind of him. He had enough room to give our works ample space on their own, it was a wonderful pairing. And gave me many memories I'll never forget.



More tales.... So here it is 2013 in Williamsburg Brooklyn at Sideshow Gallery for the big yearly group show. This was the painting I picked to enter into the show. I later learned that if you wanna be able to see all of your work at eye level. Make sure the work isn't this big. The work from the next year was 22X16" and sat in a really great place. This one went right to the ceiling. Hehehehe.

One more pic to go and I'll have the story for this almost finished.

One more thing. This wasn't the painting I originally wanted to put in the show. It was my second choice. The original painting was 48x36" and ended up too big to send through the usps so we had to bring it back home and re-box it up with this painting. Ended up being easier to put in our car to take to ups this time. The painting before in its box was so big that I had to ask my neighbor who happened to be home that day to help me get the box to usps. And then when they wouldn't send it. Mom and I had to find a way to get it home. I had to sit in the back of the car and hold the painting down so it wouldn't catch air. It was so big the trunk wouldn't close. Funny times. Cheers.



Me with mine way up there.
This was one of the very few times I haven't been able to stay with anyone when I visited NYC. The day before I had driven to NYC from Columbus. My friend Dee said I could stay in her studio. So I ended up on 38th street trying to sleep while a jackass was making music until 4am that night and right after was the garbage trucks. How people can sleep with all that is beyond me. Heheheh. I ended up sleeping at the Leo house that night. Great place to stay in NYC. Had a wonderful time at the opening. Hung with a lot of friends and made some new ones.
The painting now sits in my mother's bedroom.

If not for Dee and Peter Reginato I would have had a real bear to deal with getting it back home.

Story originally appeared in my Instagram feed.

My first diptych.

I began writing these stories on Instagram as a way of giving people a little more insight into myself as a painter, and not just letting the paintings do the talking, because paintings can't tell you a fucking thing other than how they look right then. :D A lot of the idea for these stories comes from one of my favorite people on the planet... Joey COCO Diaz. The guy is an ace storyteller, and he helped me realize I had stories of my own that weren't the "regular" style. Thanks for tuning in, enjoy!

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My first diptych. I remember making the chassis for these with my Dad in the wood shop at Children's Hospital in Columbus. Each panel was 36 X 60 Inches. We came in on a saturday and spent a few hours cutting up the wood and shaping it all. I remember the rush of emotions when they were sitting on a table and we took them off to look at them as if they were joined together, even without the canvas on top, I was still feeling the joy of knowing I was going to be able to make this. I always get that same feeling when making a new painting, but this time was very special to me as it was one of the few times I got to make the chassis with my Dad. I remember these were the perfect size to paint upon in my bedroom at the time. Taking the canvases from my bedroom to the garage and back again during the making was something special to me. I was also painting on this the night of Y2K. I felt if I was gonna go out, i'd go out working on something I loved. I remember sitting on the chair beside my bed with a small bottle of the deep violet red and slowly making progress on coating the panels in the same beautiful violet blue red, raising my head to see 12:01 and thinking how stupid all the people were who thought we were gonna die that night. Then I went right back to painting. Later, both canvases were poured on at my friend Garth's place in the basement, as I needed a large enough place to do the pouring and didn't have one myself. The garage I would normally use was too cold in January. SO I asked my friend. His Mom Joyce said it was cool, and I brought it my paint supplies to his basement. I remember looking around that room and wishing I had a studio as big as that basement room. It was probably 16 X 32 feet.