ABOUT ME
My work is a mash-up of a formal education and life-long absorption in the fine arts combined with years of on-the-job experience as a professional illustrator, graphic designer and advertising creative director.
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As a result, I frequently mix traditional drawing and painting methods with digital apps and techniques. I'll often use digital tools like Adobe Illustrator and Photoshop to streamline the initial planning phases of a project, before switching to good old brushes and paint for its final realization.
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The Pop Art movement, especially the work of Larry Rivers, Claes Oldenburg, Jim Dine, David Hockney and Wayne Thiebaud is a big influence, as is the work of “proto-pop” masters Marcel Duchamp and Charles Demuth.
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In particular, Jasper Johns' encaustic paintings inspired my ongoing explorations of that ancient medium. You can read more about the encaustic method below.
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I also consider the later work of James Abbott McNeill Whistler — of “Whistler's Mother” fame — to be an important inspiration when it comes to figurative painting and portraiture.
the world today
makes no sense, why should i paint
pictures that do?
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—Pablo Picasso
ABOUT ENCAUSTIC
An Egyptian encaustic painting from around 100-300 AD
Encaustic is an ancient painting technique dating back to at least the 1st Century BC. Many art historians even consider several of the Lascaux cave paintings to be early forms of encaustic art.
Its defining ingredient is heat.
Rather than suspending pigments in oils or polymers, the encaustic method employs melted beeswax — which is then infused with various colors — and applied to a canvas, or more often, a wood panel.
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During the entire painting session the wax must be kept in a hot, liquid state. Today's practitioners typically work on portable electric griddles or a heated palette made specifically for encaustic painting.
Because the hot wax cools so rapidly upon contact with the painting surface, the artist's brushstrokes are by necessity, decisive, quick dabs. And while this rapid cooling makes subtle blending effects more difficult to achieve, it also expedites the build up of expressive impasto textures.
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In the 1950s, Jasper Johns revitalized and modernized encaustic painting by adroitly using its inherent dimensional characteristics to create sly, politically-charged Pop Art masterpieces that literally drip with visual satire. “Flag,” his 1955 depiction of the 48-state star spangled banner, is perhaps his most famous example.
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Prior to Jasper Johns, the technical and logistic difficulties posed by the encaustic process restricted its popularity among contemporary artists, although Diego Rivera and the Belgian painter James Ensor frequently experimented with the medium.
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Encaustic painting enjoyed a resurgence in recent decades. Modern artists continue to expand the medium's potential by incorporating an inventive array of surfaces, tools and techniques.