Deepwater Horizon: Ink, watercolour, copper powder, spraypaint and airbrush on wood panel. 2010.

This piece was painted live at Lightning in a Bottle in Irvine, CA May 28-30 as a part of the Lightning in a Paintcan project alongside 28 other rad painters. I worked three 6-8 hour days on it in the company of some of the most incredible visual and sonic artists this side of the abyss.. I chose to depict the Deepwater Horizon oil spill as a gesture towards dialogue on the subject.. we are all responsible for this environmental atrocity. I was so inspired and horrified simultaneously by photos of the spill and its impact on the shoreline.. this painting is but a reminder of the events taking place in the gulf- a spectacle that is all too conveniently forgotten in the midst of an immaculately engaging, beautiful gathering of creative powers in the hills outside LA.. it is imperative that we recognize that even in our displays of ‘alternative’ culture, we are very much dependent on, and consumptive of, that sticky black enigma.. in our insatiable quest for this increasingly scarce nonrenewable resource, we are complicit in the trampling of practically everything and anything that stands between our economic system and its most precious commodity.

What might a new paradigm look like? How can we model best practices in the midst of this cathartic global transformation? Plagued by such paralyzing questions, i figured the least i could do is paint that mess. so hideously gorgeous, i dont know whether to swoon or wretch.

This painting was created as a part of the Lightning in a Paintcan project. here’s the deal:

“Lightning in a Paintcan will be raising thousands of dollars that go directly towards purchasing art and music supplies for under-funded schools.

Here’s how it works: Scattered throughout Lightning in a Bottle will be dozens of live painters creating with 100% used and recycled paint. During the event we will hold a silent auction where you can bid on your favorite art piece, and hopefully take it home with you.

Proceeds from this project will go to support Sonic Muze, a non-profit organization that helps supply musical instruments and art supplies to local schools in need. By bidding on your favorite art you will be helping us support the next generation of artists!”

"Shout it out/ or better yet sing"

New screenprint designs for the CA/CO based electro/acoustic musicians Lynx and Janover. A 3 layer version is headed to print.. can’t wait to see what it looks like screened on fabric!

45W Mural on Unurth Street Art , Wallfarmers.ca , & the Dirt Floor

The mural was painted at 45 West Hastings (alley entrance wall) in Vancouver, BC- a collaboration with east van painter Jordan Bent. The mural was  supported by the 45 West performing arts studio, David Duprey and the City of Vancouver’s Great Beginnings initiative. This was the second mural that mr. bent and i have teamed-up on, the first was an indoor wall at the Burnaby Centre for Mental Health and Addictions.

I decided to include a construction crane, however banal and inconspicuous, in the mural to speak to the current state of social and economic ‘renewal’/gentrification of the immediate area around the mural site. The crane is at eye level, and right near the doorbell- hoping it might catch a few eyes over time.

As we were painting in the alley way, we found ourselves working in what felt like a precarious place between poverty and relentless development. While the alley was still frequented by local residents (some of whom came to tend to their addictions, ALL of whom were incredibly supportive and positive), right next door construction was underway to erect shiny new market-price condos.

As artists, it is important to recognize the role we play in the gentrification of marginalized neighbourhoods. While we may not catalyze the upheaval that gentrification causes, we certainly are complicit in it, and in some ways we arguably help facilitate that process, right? by making all the public surfaces look beautiful, we are paving the way for more pervasive forms of development in the street-level public sphere- it makes the neighbourhood more attractive to wealthy people who want to live amongst creative people.

But what if the creative people, current residents, and community that makes up the downtown eastside cannot afford to live in their neighbourhood any longer, once rent and property value and the cost of ammenities increases dramatically after more affluent new residents move in? What happens when the creative people who make the DTES the most vibrant community in the city are forced out by the invisible hand?

Reflecting on all of that, i decided to stencil in the crane that was busy building sparkly concrete things nextdoor, and pay a little homage to the uniquely ironic time and place that we found ourselves painting in, for better and for worse.

Thank you to the people who live and work in that alley, and with the cooperative performing arts studio at 45 west, for your permission and support! We hope we offered a positive contribution to the visual narrative on the zero block of W hastings.

I recently submitted a few photos from the Built-In Obsolete Mid-Forms Festival installation to Skewed Online Art Magazine. Below is some info about the show, which took place around this time last year at the Mid-Forms Festival 09.

Built-in Obsolete
Showcase installation for the Mid-Forms Festival 09
(Great Northern Way Campus, Vancouver)

Medium: immersive assemblage/ trash sculpture

Built-In Obsolete was a refuge created some time ago, an obsolete sanctuary to protect us from an imminent disaster that never arrived. Whenever it was thrown together, it was outfitted in all the latest cutting edge gadgets- dusty treasure and weathered wood, rusted-out contraptions and outdated inventions- a curious assemblage of technological oddities long forgotten, operating in ways they were never meant to be.

This installation juxtaposes the contemporary and antiquated, evoking a metaphysical fiction wherein the ordinary tools of today- the technology that we take for granted – may be considered in an extraordinary light.

I’ll be posting a few pages from my most recent sketchbook. Here’s a start. This one’s for Valparaiso, Chile, where the cerros make the landscape look like little mountains of crooked fingers.