Um, that still life painting looks like...

Boobs. There, I said it. Not that I tried to conceal my intention when I painted two rather voluptuous pomelos and called the painting "Double P's." Does still life always have to appear stuffy, taking itself soooo seriously? The theme of my blog post today is the significance of humor in art and assigning value to irreverent art.

Sometimes I feel so much passion, compassion, humanity, pain and joy that I wish I could create a painting that translates my emotions so provocatively that it moves people to tears, like the way I feel when I listen to a Sigur Ros song really, really loudly. And then I go and paint a pair of suggestive pomelos. Why? I believe sharing humor is one of my best contributions to humanity. Maybe my painting will not move you to cry, but what if it moves you to laughter?

Cancer Treatment Centers of America use "laughter therapy" to promote overall health and wellness in their patients. Laughter may help prevent a heart attack, according to a 2009 study performed by cardiologists at University of Maryland. 

"The old saying that 'laughter is the best medicine,' definitely appears to be true when it comes to protecting your heart," says Michael Miller, M.D., director of the Center for Preventive Cardiology at the University of Maryland Medical Center. (Source: Laughter is the Best Medicine for Your Heart | University of Maryland Medical Center)

Now, how do I determine the value of my flippant still life oil painting? Imagine a business person has to assign a monetary value to every deliverable he creates at work and then has to present the dollar amount to his coworkers at every meeting. If a given project took him 20 hours and he makes $25 per hour, he would announce his deliverable as worth $500. Or say a family physician must announce to her patient that the value of her effort toward that check-up is worth $150. Would you feel differently about your effort, your work? Does this make you feel awkward? Yeah, it does for us painters, too.

My "Double P's" painting currently hangs at Flying M Coffeehouse in downtown Boise, vulnerably announcing to the many patrons of this local favorite shop that it is worth $550. I did not arbitrarily assign that price. I take a price-per-square-inch approach, derived by calculating my target hourly wage (trust me, it's conservative), how many paintings I can make in a year, less my overhead. Operations aside, this painting achieves a balanced, interesting composition with beautiful pop-off-your-wall colors, and it involves honed technique of perspective and depth.

When you perform your annual spring cleaning, make a mental note of how much you spent on the junk you are now donating without hesitation. I bet it adds up to over $500. I would also wager a bet that you would not throw a $500 original oil painting into your donation pile, especially one that brings you heart-healthy laughter every day.

"The ability to laugh -- either naturally or as learned behavior -- may have important implications in societies such as the U.S. where heart disease remains the number one killer," says Miller. "We know that exercising, not smoking and eating foods low in saturated fat will reduce the risk of heart disease. Perhaps regular, hearty laughter should be added to the list." (Source)

Announcing Daily Paintings

I create still life paintings to bring attention to the visual exquisiteness of fresh produce, the seemingly everyday objects that provide us sustenance.  I initially started with "Still Life with Attitude," my irreverent series depicting produce set up in personified and often "suggestive" manners.  I am excited to announce a new still life series of daily paintings.

We all know the adage “you are what you eat.”  I want to be art.  The implication is that by consuming beautiful, wholesome foods, you will in turn inherit this beauty in the form of health.  I purchase fruit and vegetables for my subjects grown sustainably and local to Idaho whenever possible.  If not grown locally, I select foods from producers from small farms and with a commitment to fair trade and wages.

I use 4" x 5" and 5" x 5" canvases and paint the subject in one sitting, working alla prima (wet-on-wet paint). My goal is to capture the rich color and texture of the fruit or vegetable, those traits that make it desirable to consume.  I currently use a dark gray or matte black painted wood base for the subject to help the color and texture pop off the canvas.

I will show my first batch of these small oil paintings at my March show at Flying M Coffee House.  Watch my Etsy store for these little paintings, coming soon...

My Spirit Animal

Painting the Palouse fields of eastern Washington state and north-western Idaho has become one of my favorite landscape subjects. This is the largest size painting I have tackled to-date, and it became deeply personal to me by accident.

I wanted to add a wildlife subject in the foreground and decided on a red tail hawk sitting on a fence post. When I stepped back from working on the hawk, I realized I had painted an incredibly stoic, sharp-sighted animal that exists in Native American folklore as a spirit animal known for protection and clear vision. I had positioned him above a sharp barb wire fence looking into a sunrise. The painting took on its own life. It represents a new dawn--my new profession as an artist--and the hawk has overcome fear and strife to witness the new day rising, to show me my life's dream is upon me, is real, if I can only have the courage to embrace it.

My mom spent eight days in intensive care in a hospital in Spokane over the holidays after suffering what thankfully ended up as only a minor stroke. On the drive up to Spokane from Boise to visit my mom in the hospital, scared about her condition and confused by the nagging question of why her, why my healthy, active, charismatic and always caring mother, I saw no less than 10 red tail hawks, all looking or flying in the direction of my home town. My mom is home and well.

Contact me for purchase information. I also sell limited-edition giclee (fine art) prints of this painting.