Could painting actually be better than sex?

Why melt? Because I want to enter the painting. I want the gates of ecstasy to open, to experience the merge of colors and textures, and to discover new possibilities.

First I build a city by looking at it, concentrating on its proper angles, turns, the scale of things. But then I want to dissolve into it, to feel like I'm one with it, existing on this particular day, while I'm staring at it, purposefully, with a mission to truly feel it. And just like Gaudi, I want to re-build it from the drips of paint, forming up like sand castles, directing my thoughts with these rays of hope, droplets of creation.

I've been waiting for this day for so long. It's because no matter how great sex is, with you giving into it completely, this is so much better. I peak time and again with each penetration of a new drip. It's an opening to absolute freedom.

But why not melt it all? It's about questioning boundaries, about giving you a glimpse of what could be vs. what is. It's about not being perfect but always striving for it. Perhaps I'm not strong enough to destroy it, as it pains me when my subjects get completely dismembered: houses losing their windows, foundations merging into roofs. Maybe these are windows into my soul and it's tragic to me when they clogged up. Perhaps it's this struggle between the practical side of me and the crazy destroyer side? They're always at war it seems and my work is an attempt to have them co-exist.

Do you have two warring sides? How do they and where do they play out their struggles?

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I do write quite a bit about the artmaking process, and you could be among the first to see my newest blogs if you sign on to my mailing list !

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And this 36x48 oil and wax on canvas of Parisian rooftops is now finished, beaming with light and raw energy. It's available at $1,900. 

Please feel free to email with your thoughts and comments!

Is Social Media Killing Our Self Worth?

My time in the studio is the time when I get away from the world, relax into my inner self and discover things within my psyche. Yet, here I am, working away and hoping the door will open any second and someone will come in to ask what I'm working on, and perhaps praise it, or even offer some critique or a word of advice. I know I'm here for me, to pacify my worries, to take a break from the hassles of my world. Yet, I crave acceptance. I crave recognition. I really want someone to finally see that I have talent, someone from the art world to pick me up and take me places. Maybe that's just a natural human state, the one Dale Carnegie talked so much about? Our need for acceptance...

It's stifling though. It also got a hundred times worse with the need for instant gratification via social media. I skipped a week of painting. Yet, instead of yearning for that time alone with myself, all I kept thinking throughout this week was: "When I finally get to the studio, I need something truly powerful to show my Instagram followers and Facebook fans". Then, when the long-awaited time in the studio had arrived, I spent most of my time shooting videos of my process instead of really dissolving into it. I couldn't stop myself either even though I knew this was utterly wrong. It was almost like I was afraid to truly listen to my inner voice. Instead, I was drowning it with the desire to be seen and praised.

And then, when the likes and comments didn't come as fast as I wanted, I started to really doubt myself and my abilities. I took down the stage I most enjoyed because this lack of attention shamed me into hating my process. I almost wanted to bring the painting back to the stage when it was most liked by the viewers, but then I caught myself and decided that this is enough.

I need to cut out this destruction of my self-worth by avoiding my phone during my working time. I need a vacation from social media. At the end of the day, I'm doing this for my journey and I won't go anywhere unless I'm fully on board. If I continue down this road of adjusting my actions because of social media, my inner voice willalways be unheard by me, or worse it'll be shamed into silence because I'll only be focused on the approval by others. The only way to get away from this is to have a clean break. This is how I truly start doing things for me, for my growth: I stop caring...

Do you find yourself drowned by social media? Do you schedule time-outs? Are they week-long vacations? Or do you have periods during each day when you stay away?