I was at my mother's for thanksgiving. She is keeping The Yellow Girl and The Blue Lady at her house. I'm not sure if this photo captures it, but the way she hung them is simply majestic. They dominate the room.

When I painted them, I imagined they were sort of like folk art tapestries. I will explain their background in a future post.

Thank you. I hope everyone had a swell thanksgiving.

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Here's a skateboard that I painted for my friend, Greg, a few months ago. I went a little crazy with the bright colors.

I love seeing my paintings in other people's homes; how and where folks hang them. Matt bought Stalker earlier this year. Looks like it's in good company between The Thing and The Exorcist.

The Thing poster seen in this picture was one of the main inspirations for my figurative abstract work.

The death metal / grind band, Cretin, has pre-released their album, Stranger. The band used one of my paintings for the cover and a couple of other paintings for the CD/LP booklet. The album is on Relapse Records.

More information about the album is HERE.

Thanks to Lori from Ideal Hair for sending over this great shot. Lori bought her Stranger giclee prints last weekend, during Open Studios.

Thanks to Sean for sharing this fantastic picture of my dry pigments.

Click on the pics to advance.

It was a very successful first weekend. Many old friends came by and I made a number of new friends. It was a crazy start on Saturday with a big sale, then two separate folks who walked into the studio shook their head and left. I can laugh now, but at the time it stung a little.

I learned a lot and had some very meaningful and informative conversations. The kindness was a bit overwhelming. It's a strange thing to put yourself full throttle into an endeavor and turn around, hang it on a wall, and ask people to come judge it. A new experience for me, with a lot of great ups and downs (mostly, very kind, ups).

Thank you to everyone who stopped by. Even the few who shook their heads and took off. 

The Santa Cruz Sentinel published a well written article on me and a fellow painter. Go check it out HERE.

The author, Christa Martin, asked for a head shot. I asked if I could politely refuse. She said that her editor insisted. I sent the worst possible picture, 'They won't print this.' Well, they printed it.

Learning every day.

After some encouragement, I applied, and was accepted into Santa Cruz's Open Studios Art Tour 2014. A cool honor.

I have around twenty-five paintings that I'm willing to part with at the moment. One piece is down at the Santa Cruz Art League show and one is at the R. Blitzer show. Both are smaller 16x20" paintings.

My studio is a mess. My carpet is filthy. But, with the help of my family and friends, the paintings are hung, and I think I'm ready to open the studio to the public.

We'll see if anyone shows up.