Sorry Lot Full
36″ x 36″
Acrylic on canvas
2014
The dreaded full parking lot. A moment of frustration in a town where the population increases twenty fold. Typically this sign is met with the a hopeful visitor hot, cranky, hungry, thirsty and wondering where you can get an all day spot without getting the car towed. Welcome to deep summer.
West End Lot 003
36″ x 48″
Acrylic on canvas
2014
As with much of my work, I like to try and capture anonymity and the overlooked. I’m fascinated with what we see but do not. A parking lot in a seaside resort town reveals the pursuit of reaching enchanted places during the hot summer months without revealing the beauty of the location itself. The cluster of parked cars offers that somewhere in this location there are the anonymous visitors taking a summer day by the sea. The lines of the parking spots, or the rows of cars, offer a depth that I look for in realism. The bleached out hues hint to the intensity of the high sun. The pale tones of the asphalt at high noon emits heat. It’s a hot day and everyone wants to get to somewhere with a breeze and water. The price? Hot door handles, inferno cabin interiors, long rides, and the risk of not getting to park at the beach at all after driving two hours from the city due to it being full.
I love summer.
West End 010
12″ x 12″
Oil on board
2014
Provincetown affords countless vistas; lilac choked lanes, quaint stores and pristine beaches teeming with wildlife. I rarely paint that. What I gravitate towards is telephone lines and parking lots. Sexy, right? I stride to evoke the feeling of a location and often times that’s better captured by what’s not shown.
I write this looking out at another Nor’Easter pummeling Boston. It’s been a long winter and we are not even close to done yet.
This past Monday I returned from a week of flawless Miami Beach weather. It was my second year attending the same weekend in February due to the Wynwood Art Walk. My impression last year was of surprise. The juxtaposition of cutting edge graffiti against modern art galleries, within a transitional area of downtown Miami, is impressionable. Although some say that it has already been overshadowed as a night out for bar-hopping hipsters, I took away something else.
Galleries attract collectors and artsy types that seek them out. This second weekend of every month event does more than allow an art lover to see many galleries without an appointment, it offers all walks of life a chance to revel and observe. Museums have had that cornered for a long time but you can’t pick up a Warhol, or an unknown struggling artist’s work, if you’re feeling flush. To see so many attendees is a rarity for the art scene up here in Boston. We have Open Studios but it’s is delimited to a different section of the city per month. There are open markets but not the same.This concentration of creative cum entertainment offers a monthly chance to see the works of talented artists of many mediums in a consistent locale. And it goes beyond these second Saturdays. A major event happening over this upcoming President’s Day Weekend is Art Wynwood and it coincides with the International Miami Boat Show. This brings a lot of eyes out to the Midtown, Design District and Wynwood arts scene. All of this exposure and chance to see, or even better, to buy great works is exciting. Miami is getting it right with art world. Boston needs this. So could many other cities for art exposure and for the artists. Granted it helps to have eighty degree evenings. I’m sure we could work something out (I’m looking at you many convention centers of Boston…).
Needless to say, I’m looking for a cheap flight down to Miami this weekend. You should too.
Oh, and I also took in the Peréz Art Museum Miami. I need a whole other blog about that gorgeous palace of awesome.
Exciting. I began my new series Anonymous Self Portraits.
I just wanted to thank those that came to see and bought paintings from my recent show at James’s Gate in JP. I am flattered by all the feedback and support. I’m in this for the long haul and hope to make your investment in me pay off down the road. I deeply admire all artists that work tirelessly to produce good work. I hope to do the same.
On that note, Happy New Years (say it a little bit crazy for full effect)!
Hey, Internets. So… I’m really new to this selling-myself-as-a-brand thing. I’m told I NEED a blog. Guess I gotta start somewhere if I wanna get some bills paid and sell some arts. I promise to try and write some thought provoking, deeply artsy stuff here as I go, but for now, excuse me as I do a warm up lap and just post a link to an article that was posted (and printed) about my current show Casey Was Here today.
http://jamaicaplaingazette.com/2013/12/20/jp-artist-preserves-casey-overpass-in-paintings/
Give it a read if ya got two minutes. Thanks, y’all.