Interior

Flipped Composition Starts

Drawing is half the battle. I thought that it would be interesting to try a process of flipping a composition as a starting point, partly as a shortcut and to see if the composition ‘works’. I also wanted to try some ‘faster’ process using acrylic paint, so starting with a smaller scale, working out a sketch using acrylic and then flipping it on a larger painting for oil. Of course I let it evolve and diverge some (or rather a lot), and then let the painting aspects of color schemes and later discovery processes play out. Here are a couple of experiments…

Some swings of color and a bit of terror…

Interior with Mismatched Furniture, 2024
acrylic on canvas
24 x 18 inches
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This painting I felt a need for a jarring aspect. The color has a harsh transition between top and bottom, and the chairs can’t seem to be on the same plane. It coincided with the 2024 election, and for this reason I will let it be as uncomfortable as it is.

Interior with Mismatched Furniture and Floor, 2024
oil on canvas
40 x 30 inches
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In these two I decided to simplify the color schemes, and let the perspective twist do its thing.

Red and Pink Interior with Gentle Shifting, 2024
acrylic on canvas
24 x 18 inches
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Interior Beginning to Twist, 2024
oil on canvas
40 x 30 inches
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Chairs contemplating

Chairs are really a placeholder for a person. While empty, I imagine they might have a life of their own in which they converse with or comment on their environment. Sometimes the art on the wall says more about the space than the room itself.

Interior Contemplating a Square, 2024
oil on canvas
30 x 24 inches
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Interior with Pink Chair and Landscape, 2024
acrylic on canvas
24 x 18 inches
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Floors and Experiments

Having a construct (the set of symbols and general sense of how the painting plays out) allows for a separation of ideas.
In this painting, I decided to limit the colors on my palette, and strip out the ornamentation of pattern. I was on the fence with this piece, but it has grown on me. It feels soft, but also slightly eerie.

Quiet Interior without Embellishments, 2023
oil on canvas
40 x 30 inches
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This painting makes me laugh. The inset painting of a person on a horse (all made up) is a bit ridiculous, as is the large, fleshy pink form of the rug. To me it looks like a tongue or a slab of processed meat. The dark form at the top is a ceiling shape, twisting off of the walls perhaps.

The Somewhat Humorous Interior, 2024
oil on canvas
40 x 30 inches
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Another clash of color, and a slippery warped floor on which the chair seems about to slide. This painting will benefit from a frame soon.

Interior with Warped Rug, 2024
oil on canvas
40 x 30 inches
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Chairless Interiors

Stripping the chair from the image allowed me to explore just the relationships between wall, floor, and ceiling. I kept the painting within the painting, as that allows me the opportunity to add some content to the image and discover possible meaning.

The juxtaposition of paintings on the wall started as a conflict between vertical and horizontal layouts. The image an 18th century puffed up nobleman with medals, and a reclining nude (originally painted as soft porn for the men of the era) seems rich in the possibility of interpretations, which of course I’ll leave to the viewer.

Room with Competing Pomposities, 2024
oil on canvas
30 x 24 inches
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The perspective grid on the floor seems to feel like it is sinking, or sliding down. The wall treatment of thick and brushy work evokes a storm, and the inset painting of a sailboat makes the painting a depiction of impending doom… a possible shipwreck.

Room with Potential Shipwreck, 2024
oil on canvas
30 x 24 inches
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Strange Color

Interior with Funnel Cake, 2023
oil on canvas
30 x 24 inches

This painting started from a current charcoal drawing, though the inset picture changed. I had wanted some ‘spooky color’.
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Yellow Interior with Looming, 2023
oil on canvas
30 x 40 inches

Every so often I attempt a ‘yellow painting’, which i find to be a difficult color. For the sense of looming or impending, I tried to use a more graphic approach.
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Interior with Hot and Impending, 2023
oil on canvas
30 x 24 inches

High intensity reds and turquoise (image is dark), and a strange shape impeding from below. Some stability, with a lot of sliding.
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Expanse

I have always loved brushwork for its own sake. I love it on Sargent’s clothing, and in Resnick and Guston field paintings. I follow that tradition, but use it in context of an interior space. A floor turns into a wall and dissolves into a swirling void, an expanse that transcends simplified descriptions of walls/furniture/interior. Something about seeing the expected plane turn into the sublime dance paint and brush gives me joy.

Interior with an Opening, 2022
oil on canvas
40 x 30 inches
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Interior with Rifts, 2022
oil on canvas
30 x 40 inches

This painting does hold more meaning for me It is a tearing apart of the cultural fabric over absurd false dichotomies. It is as absurd as fighting over whether a slice of cake or a donut is better.
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Interior with Conflicted Rug and Yellow Chair, 2023
oil on canvas
24 x 18 inches
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Rugs and Carpets

With wallpaper skewing the perspective, the next plane to engage with is the floor. Playing with rugs and carpet design leads me into more options for painterly exploration. Sometimes I want to play with curves and squiggles, or more angles that distort the perspective. It can be a fine line between disorienting and just enough mental tickle. Occasionally it entices me to add a further illusion of sinking depth. That might have some meaning, but I’m not sure I want to go there…

Interior with Rift and Pie, 2021
Acrylic then oil on canvas
40 x 30 inches
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Interior with Lonely Chair and Plummeting Rug, 2022
oil on canvas
24 x 20 inches
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Interior with Conversation Pit Rug, 2022
oil on canvas
40 x 30 inches
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Interior Comparing Options, 2023
oil on canvas
40 x 30 inches
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Interior with Missing Furniture and Art, 2023
oil on canvas
30 x 40 inches
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Interior with the Wrong Color Chair, 2023
oil on canvas
30 x 24 inches
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Interior with Looming Carpets and Desserts, 2023
oil on canvas
24 x 30 inches
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Interior with Possible Equilibrium, 2023
oil on canvas
24 x 18 inches
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Interior with Voluminous Flats, 2023
oil on canvas
28 x 22 inches
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Inside out Expectations

With recognizable images, the viewer brings their understanding of how things should look, or what we expect things to look like. I’ve already broken enough of the perspective to force a suspension of disbelief similar to surrealism or a less objective abstractions. By bringing the outside into an interior without the use of a window or doorway, the image becomes a little more curious.

A pink interior is not something one sees every day, so why not! And bringing in all the elements I enjoy playing with. Brushy paint surface (on the pink) dissolving into another plane, a half full glass and the hint of an orange or apple. 2 point perspective grid on the carpet draws you into a cityscape coming in from outside while a window hints at a bucolic garden just outside. Add in a missing sofa just because. What color would you make the sofa to go with the art?

Interior with Conundrum, 2018
oil on canvas
24 x 36 inches

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A variation of blue walls with a tilted vertical striped wallpaper sets the stage for a living room furniture arrangement to contemplate a landscape, seemingly entering the space. The inset painting of a slice of cake seems to be offering the first slice, however it might be from another cake altogether.

Interior Contemplating Cake and Other Distractions, 2019
oil on canvas
36 x 48 inches

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This painting directly creates an itch with the upside down picture on the wall, while the leaning table pushes the bounds of spatial expectation just a little more. A fly has landed in the middle of a piece of paper which hangs in the balance on the tables edge.

Interior with Hairy Arm, 2018
oil on canvas
28 x 22 inches

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Horizontal formats

For the longest time I have been mostly working with vertical format compositions. I think this started with landscapes breaking the landscape format tradition, and trying to squeeze a wide view into a narrow space, requiring a few tricks and adjustments. The same happens with the architectural spaces. So to shake things up every so often I’ll go for horizontal format.

This painting was worked on during the strange election chaos of 2020-21. The large, looming wall with confounding grid makes the arrangement of furniture and rug seem small and somewhat helpless.
Despite the reaction to current events, the painting is a continuation of formal experiments with pace and perspective.

Interior Contemplating the Overwhelming, 2021
oil on canvas
30 x 40 inches
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This painting was begun in 2011-12 and re-worked in 2021. I was interested in the steep oblique angles defining a corner of a room. In person, the space really shifts with the viewing angle, opening up and appearing to follow the viewer as they walk by.
The 2021 adjustments were a re-working of color and adding/adjusting/eliminating elements, while keeping the main angle.

Interior Corners with Shifting Fortunes, 2021

30 x 40 inches
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Interior with Beckoning Expanse., 2021
oil on canvas
28 x 22 inches
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Interior Contemplating Reflection, 2021
oil on canvas
28 x 22 inches
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Warped Interiors

Warping the perspective can be a delicate balance. It’s a fine line between ‘pleasantly disorienting’ and ‘sea sickening funhouse’. Perspective is implied and then expected to follow certain rules. Breaking those rules is fun.

With Interior without Imploding Chair, the chair seems to be folding in on itself against a wall that refuses to go along with the rules.

Similarly, Steep Interior with What Could Have Been flips the floor plane up (carpet seen more from above) while the wall plane and room interior are seen from increasingly lower angles.

Dizzying Interior with Runner shifts the entire floor plane to an angle, which seems to be jostling with the walls to right itself.

Warped Interior with Cupcake seems to squeeze the furniture into the corner of the room. Thankfully there is a cupcake to enjoy.