JUNE 2008 - "Forest Park Fantasy" 16x20, acrylic on canvas, June 2007

One of the few traditional paintings that I did last year. This one was meant to be more like a sketch for a larger more finished work but I never got around to it. Like "Morning Light II" from 2007 this work was also inpsired by a photograph I took while visiting forest park in Missouri. Maybe this summer I will be able to paint a new version.

 

 

APRIL 2008 - "Cinnamon Road " 15x15, acrylic on masonite, April 2002

Inspired by a song from Tangerine Dream of the same name, this one was creating during college when I was working on my senior project which was a series of album covers/designs for a imaginary CD sleeve project for the same band. When I first listened to the album "Hyberborea" by Tangerine Dream I was so inspired by the title track I had these semi-visions of a wide open desert like landscape where everything was warm & dusty. It also gave me fragmented memories of a farm that I visited when I was really young. Its still one of my all time favorate albums because of the psychological impact that it has on me and the feelings of being in a open space like this everytime I listen to it. The squares were meant to create visual tension by reinforcing the picture plain which contrasts the deep open space created by the atmosphere and the road.

 

FEBRUARY 2008 - "Golden Twilight #2 " 24x24, acrylic on masonite, February 2003

One of the first landscapes that I did in my more "contemporary" style back in 2003 along with my "Glowing Hills" & "New Isle Lake Glow" set which were all done around the same time. I remember painting this one along with its companion in about 2 or 3 days, very fast because I felt like I had a new burst of creative energy after my lazy fall of 2002. This set never got published but now I see why, not the best compositions or balance of color, but the inspiration to create simple & dreamlike landscapes was there. This work was the first of many paintings that utilize similar approaches expressing a certain look and feel. This approach was characterized by bubble-like trees, semi-monochrome color, & simple compositions that had an easily recognizable fore, middle & background. I also enjoyed using exaggerated light, atmosphere & perspective to give these landcapes a strange all-encompassing light source.

 

 

JANUARY 2008 - "Morning Light #2" 16x20, acrylic on canvas, January 2007

Looking back at this painting (which is inspired by a photo taken from Forest Park in St. Louis) I sort of regret calling it "Morning Light" because it never evoked that feeling or time of the day for me. Really it should be called "Late Afternoon Light". But I supposed it could be the warm light of morning too. Anyway this painting is surely more traditional than most of my works, and I remember not being too happy with it when I finished it. It just felt too "soupy" for me. But technically its a pretty good painting of mine I think. It really has a nice atmosphere to it within a short depth of field. My girlfriend and I visited Forest Park & the St. Louis zoo in Spring of 2005. I remember taking tons of photos which I still plan on doing some paintings from. Since I'm not able to travel that much I have fond memories of the scene and sense of place that this painting expresses.

 

DECEMBER 2007 - "Happy Little Winter Scene" 12x12, acrylic on canvas, December 2001

A little landscape that I painted for my mother the December of my senior year in college. I remember painting it right before I was going home for Christmas. One of the few winter scenes that I've ever painted, I probably created it in one day if I remember correctly. Maybe someday I'll revisit a winter landscape like this in a new painting.

 

NOVEMBER 2007 - "Autumn Glimpse #2" 18x24, acrylic & leaves on masonite, Autumn 2001

Another painting inspired by fall that I used real leaves in, as well as sand to help make the texture in the surrounding border. The landscape is from a photo of Altoona, by the old Wilson drive before the bypass went through. This is one of many works that was not properly documented. If I still had the original by the time I graduated I would have put this one in my landscape portfolio the following summer. This month I hope to finally do a new set inspired by this painting that I will submitt to Sun Dance. It always seems like by the time I get around to doing autumn inspired paintings the season quickly comes to a close. Or at least the colors fall away!

 

OCTOBER 2007 - "Steven's Tree" 18x24, acrylic & leaves on masonite, October 2001

This painting (poorly photographed) in a way is one of my first real decorative works, and the first of many of my "simple tree" paintings. Done during the fall of my senior year at college. The tree is actually the tree that stands between the Main Building & the Morrison building at MCAD. (under the skywalk). So I named it after Steven's Avenue right there on campus. The leaves are actual leaves I found on campus. The following month this painting was shown at the holiday art sale at the phipps center for the arts in Hudson, WI. I really like the texture I painted in the border, which I used acrylic gel medium to create. Like many of my works done during this time I'm not really sure where this work is. I either sold it at one of the MCAD art sales or one of my coffee shop shows in college.

 

 

SEPTEMBER 2007 - "A Change of Season" 24x32, acrylic on masonite. September 2002

One of the many paintings I did during fall 2002 right after I found out I had a chronic disease of my colon. I remember being really sick and sort of burned out on art and life in general. I probably spent more time playing video games than painting that fall while I lived in my parents basement. But I did create some strong works. I think this is one of them. It depicts a country road near my home town. Its hard to tell from the bad photo but its a very textural work. Its a bright luminous painting that I think expresses a sort of fleeting atmosphere. I think it also expresses a loneliness while the season gets colder and the horizon grows darker!

I believe " A Change of Season" is the first painting that Art Holdings in Minneapolis sold of mine. At the time it was the most that one of my paintings ever sold for. If I remember correctly they sold it for $750. I recieved half of that amount.

 

 

AUGUST 2007 - "Into the Waves " 24x32, acrylic on masonite, August 2003

One of my "fantasy" landscapes that was originally created for Sun Dance graphics back in 2003. I finished the set but I wasn't completely satisfied with them so I never submitted the works to my publisher. When I was in high school I was very inspired by marine art, not only because it was so fun to paint but because it offered an escape. I've only been to the ocean once and I have no concrete memory of it so this painting is also about that experience as well. I hope to do a new version of this set one of these days.

 

JULY 2007 - "Fantasy Palm #2 " 18x24, acrylic on masonite, July 2005

One of my older decorative works, this painting was one of the first, or maybe even the very first works that I used stencils in. Very simple idea but with a strong design. The reason why its called Fantasy Palm is because its just a vehicle for fantasizing about a different enviroment like Florida. Obviously where I live there are no palm trees but I like the simple idea of using different trees in decorative motifs. Anyway about a year and a half ago when I was visiting Rochester, MN (where my girlfriend used to live) we went to eat at a local pizza place that just opened up. (Mr. Pizza) When we walked in I looked to the right and I saw this print hanging on the wall between the bathrooms. It was the first time I saw one of my commercial prints hanging in a public place. We asked the owner where she got it and she didn't remember off hand but we told her it was one of my paintings that are available in the poster print market. Anyway it was a little exciting. Sure my publisher sells thousands of my posters a month but I still think it was quite a coincidence that I saw one so quick in person up here in Minneasota.!

 

 

JUNE 2007 - "June" 16x20, acrylic on canvas, June 2002

Can't believe its been 5 years since I created this painting. I remember having a new enthusiasm for straight painting around this time. I just graduated from art college and for this summer I was still living on campus. Didn't really have a regular job so I spent the summer doing a lot of paintings. It was a good time for me, the stress of getting my degree was overwith and I wasn't really thinking about the future too much. I was broke most of the time but I still was having fun. I was able to make some extra money though selling my paintings at a coffee shop near the U of M campus. Anyway this painting is really unique, I don't think that I've done anything similar to it since. I remember just being inspired to play with color and the landscape in a very spontaneous way. I really like the interplay between yellow and violet along with the deep reds. Plus the sky in this paintings is really cool. Sure the work is very naive and "young" but its so filled with emotion and discovery. Like so many paintings done during this time, the water and the small tree formations are inspired by "Lake of the Isles" in Minneapolis.

 

MAY 2007 - "Flourish #1" 24x24, acrylic on masonite, May 2006

One of many of my more "decorative" works. This one was done in response to a set I did back in 2004 called "A Moment of Nature #1 & #2" which were published and to this day they are still some of my top selling prints. I've always liked the simple format idea so I set out to do a new one that was meant to be more sophisicated. Overall this new set did'nt turn out the way I planned and I'm sure they won't sell as much as my "A Moment of Nature " ones. But I still think this is one of my best decorative/floral works from 2006. Like in many of my more abstract works the circle is an abstract representation of the sun. Just the other day I went over to my parents house and they had a kohl's catalog that comes in the newspaper sitting on the table and sure enough I saw this print in their wall decor section.

 

APRIL 2007 - "The Dawn of Man" (2001: A Space Odyessy -series)

13x16, acrylic on watercolor paper, April 2001

One of my old illustrations from college which was probably created in less than 3 hours. Done for my illustration 3 class, this was around the time I started to realize I wasn't cut out to be a illustrator. This was my junior year so right around the time I started to focus on straight painting on my own. I simply did not have any patience with my illustration assignments. I had no real style that was suitable for it and I really didn't care for the concepting part of it. I focused on "conceptual" fine art my freshman & sophmore year so by this time I just wanted to escape "ideas" and create visual works. Also I just wanted to do what I needed to finish my degree.

I haven't read too many novels in my life but out of the ones I have Authur C. Clarke's 2001 is one of my favorates. Of course the movie is one of the best films of all time so it was just as much an inspiration as the book was. I ended up doing 3 quick images that went along with book. One of the ideas of the book and film is different notions of birth, like the birth of individuals as well as the birth of mans understanding of his place in the universe. So its fitting that the paintings were created the month of my own birthday. As far as the movie goes, I could watch it every year for the rest of my life and I would still feel the same level of awe and wonder as I did the first time!

 

MARCH 2007 - "New Auburn #2" 16x26, acrylic on masonite, March 2005

An imaginary landscape named after the town of New Auburn in Wisconsin. My grandmother has had a cottage on long lake since the 70's so whenever we went up there we usually drove through the small town of New Auburn. I believe it only has a population of like 750 people. Anyway for the past few years when I drove up there myself I really noticed some of the countryside around there. So this painting in part is inspired from that. The counterpiece is actually taken from a photo that I took on the way home once, but this one is completely done from imagination. Hence the tall thin cypress like trees that really don't exist around here. I really never liked the dirt road in this painting, the perspective is way out of proportion.

This painting and its counterpiece were published in the same year they were was created and they have done pretty well as prints. The prints are just titled "Auburn #1 & #2" and they are 24x36 inches which is a lot bigger than the originals. Its strange seeing the brushwork and paint blown up to like 50% larger. Someone told my parents that my works were in a retirement home in the small town of Augusta which isn't far from my home town. So last year my father and I drove there and they had both "Auburn" prints displayed in the front lobby. It was an amazing coincidence to see my works that were purchased from the retail world on display such close to where I live. The prints were framed and had a gel coating so they looked like originals. In a way they looked better than the original paintings which I sold a year earlier at the MCAD 2005 art sale.

 

 

FEBRUARY 2007 - "Gentle Radiance #2" 24x24, acrylic on masonite, February 2004

An earlier published painting from 2004. I remember finishing this set and I was really happy to create something that had a different look to it. For me it sort of expresses an abstract interior where modern design and nature merge into one. Also the color palette is unusual for me in that I used warm colors to create texture over the cooler colors, basically creating a violet tone in the textured squares. In the end the poster prints of this set look pretty awful in comparison to the originals. I've always really liked the glowing blossoming trees hence the title Gentle Radiance. Right now I'm working on a new set that will feature the glowing trees set over a goldish background.

 

JANUARY 2007 - "Rockford #2" 18x36, acrylic on panel, January 2006

One of my favorate paintings from last year. Another example of my contemporary landscape style developed back in 2003. I've wanted to get a painting like this published for a while but I've never done one that had the exact look I wanted. The only painting I've done thats similar to this that I really liked was a commisioned one called "Golden Rockford" done for Art Holdings back in 2003. Unfortunantly the published version of this work is a lot different from the original. To make the print the publisher cut off the top & bottom and stretched the image to make a 12x36 inch panel print. In some cases a print can look better or enchance the original image, but in this case I think the originals are a lot stronger. Oh well.

 

DECEMBER 2006 - "A Farwell to Fairfax" 18x24, acrylic on panel, August 2002

This was the last painting that I created when I lived on campus at the Minneapolis College of Art & Design. So in a way its the last painting of my college days. It was just a quick idea and I believe I painted it in just one day. This was when my bedroom was my studio and all of my paintings were done on a big drafting table. Earlier in that school year my girlfriend Stacey and I broke up for the first but not the last time and I remember driving around Lake of the Isles before driving home to Wisconsin. Of course I was pretty upset. It was a dreary & rainy October day and I was listening to Tangerine Dream and their song "Fairfax" came on. Its a sad little instrumental that really could be the soundtrack to something coming to an end. Anyway I always remember that day and when I made this work it reminded me of it so I called it "Fairwell to Fairfax". I guess Fairfax sort of became a symbol of depressing college days that I knew I was saying goodbye to. I was also saying goodbye in a way to my girlfriend because I was moving back home and our relationship became a little sour. That fall we still stayed together but I was living at my parents house in Altoona while she was still at MCAD. Also that fall I became very ill with my Crohns disease and more depression so that also didn't help things much.

I find it sort of fitting to feature this painting this month because the MCAD art sale this year was my last year so I really don't have anything to do with the college anymore. Also I saw my ex-girlfriend Stacey with her new husband for the last time. (Of course because of whatever reasons she isn't allowed to say hello or even acknowledge me.) So in a way I'm saying fairwell to MCAD again and far as Stacey goes I will probably never see her again. I wish I could keep in touch with her once in a while but I guess we have to say goodbye to people and places sooner or later. Its just makes you think about how people help you create memories and how you forever associate certain places and moods to past experiences.

 

NOVEMBER 2006 - "Silver Lake Bridge in Autumn" 20x24, acrylic on masonite, November 2004

One painting from a small series of works that depict the foot bridges at Silver Lake Park in Rochester, MN. I've been meaning to do more paintings, both traditional and contemporary, using these bridges but I haven't gotten around to it yet. But I have plenty of photos for future reference. The newest painting that is inspired by these bridges is "Into Viola" which I did last spring. Even though I was not completely happy with how this non-published painting turned out I still decided to use it on the cover of my annual postcard that I mailed out the following month.

 

OCTOBER 2006 - "Fall Creek" 12x12, acrylic on canvas, October 2001

Part of a four piece series that was created for my landscape painting class that I took my senior year at MCAD. It was the 2nd of only 2 painting classes that I took while I attended the MCAD four year BFA program. This was done around the time that I started to really paint mostly landscapes on my own time but my personal work was a lot different than the landscape work I had to do for class. Only on a few works was I able to inject my own personal approaches towards landscape painting. Looking back on that class I remember how hard it was for me to focus on my class work, not only because I had my own sensibilities at that time towards painting but also I was undergoing some anxiety because it was my senior year, I was doing an internship, and I was starting to think about my senior project.

This painting is pretty much composed from a photo that I took off of Hwy. 12 going into Fall Creek where there is that small body of water to the left. There is no real stylistic approach going on in this work, its pretty much just an illustration of the scene with maybe a little extra emphasis on light. But the color is pretty accurate overall. I remember doing this work in one day. Compared to most of my other work this one stands out because of its cooler color palette and because the canvas texture gives it a different surface appearance. It was around this time that I started to really drive around to find places of inspiration, whether it be around my home town of Altoona, Wisconsin or around Minneapolis where I was going to college.

 

 

SEPTEMBER 2006 - "Autumn Light #2" 18x24, acrylic on masonite, September 2005

This painting is a newer version of a piece titled "Walking Through September" which was done in 2003. I remember the fall that I did the first version I was really going through a depression and the image really offered a sort of escape. I also remember the painting being a return to an older style which was a little more traditional. Maybe the brick archway simply symbolized a passage of my life that I was either going through or wanted to go through. At the time it had been exacly a year earlier that I was dignosed with crohns disease so I think I was still coming to terms with that. I was struggling to make money with my art because I was still living at home with my parents and I think doing art full time also became more isolating.

For some reason I didn't do a counterpiece for that image so finally 2 years later I painting this one along with another fall garden image. I submitted them to Sun Dance graphics last fall and prints have finally been released this summer. The prints have a little less yellow in them and they have a textural border. This painting was featured in two newspaper articles this month that the Eau Claire Leader Telegram & the Altoona Star did on me and my art. Right now both "Autumn Light #1 & #2" are hanging up in my parents bedroom. "Walking through September" I sold about 2 years ago to a friend of my moms. I think this image will always be very sentimental to me because of what I was going through when I created it!

 

 

AUGUST 2006 - "New Summer Road #1" 24x32, acrylic on masonite, August 2002

The first ever "commercial" painting that I ever did. "New Summer Road #1 & #2" were created the summer after I graduated when I was still living on campus. Sun Dance graphics was interested in publishing my work so this one was the first that I created for them. They really liked the portfolio that I had submitted to them the month before which mostly consisted of landscapes, some which had decorative borders. That gave them the idea to send me the art direction to do these works. (one of the only times that I have taken specific art direction from Sun Dance.) "New Summer Road #1" is actually "New Summer Road #2" for the poster print and vice versa. When I spoke with the art director on the phone I accidently told her that #1 is the painting where the road turns left and that is why the prints are mistitled. The landscape in this one is taken from a photo of Lake Road (heading west) in Altoona near the lake. I think the reason why I called it "New Summer Road" is that is was around this time that I really was becoming a landscape painter and I felt the "new" sort of expressed the idea of me discovering the beauty and simplicity of landscapes for the first time, on a conscious and artistic level. The textural parts in a way I feel represent an abstract and psychological space and the landscape offers a window into another realm of experience. Also its just a really nice "decorative" motif.

Unfortunantly shortly after I created and submitted these works I fell ill and this along with being broke forced me to move back home with my parents in Altoona, Wisconsin for a little over a year. A few weeks later during the first week of September I had to have a surgery to part of my colon, I then was diagnosed with a chronic disease of my colon. It was the first time in my life that I did not have health insurance so after about a year I was fiancially ruined. That fall of 2002 I continued to paint but none of the work I did got published so that also forced me into a deep depression. I never recieved my royalty advance for the "New Summer Road" set so I asked them to just give me a buy out which meant more money then but I would not get any future royalties on sales of these two works. I didn't know anything about the business back then and how much my art could sell in the poster market. I was completely naive. The year after I graduated was a hard time for me, personally and artistically. In 2003 I started created more work for Sun Dance and I did get 10 images that year published even though I created over a 110 works total. I ended up selling more originals that year than any other year so far. But anyway I was still struggling with money and I only had a few prints that started selling well that year and in 2004. Then at the beginning of 2005 new owners took over Sun Dance Graphics and on my royalty statements I started seeing the sales of these two works. (before I wasn't able to see the sales because both images were royality buy outs) "New Summer Road #1 and #2" were selling more per month that all of my other 35 prints combined which meant I was losing hundreds of dollars a month that I could have been making if I didn't sell my rights. I was so frustrated because of course I was an artist struggling with money, medications, rent, etc. Anyway at the beginning of 2006 I solidified a deal with my newer manager where I was able to buy back my royalty rights on these two prints which means for now on I do get my royalty cut, but of course the prints are not selling as much as they used to be. That was the first and only time I sold my royalty rights. Today these are still some of my favorate images but seeing the prints makes me a little bitter knowing the money that I lost on them!

 

 

JULY 2006 - "Springtime Park" 16x24, acrylic on masonite, July 2004

A rare painting in that it uses a more cooler palette that most of my works. I simply set out to use these colors and the results were fine and the painting turned out pretty good, although its probably one of my least favorate prints. At the time I just really wanted to get something different published so thats why I did a painting so different than my main style. That summer I also created the "Morning Garden/Summer Garden" works which is one of my favorate traditional sets. "Springtime Park" is definintely a more traditional image with its waterfalls, foot bridge, flowers and composition. I really do like the foot bridge though and I hope to do more paintings using them. The image in part is inspired by the main park in Marshfield, Wisconsin where my brother used to live.

 

 

JUNE 2006 - "New Yellow Glow" 18x24, acrylic on masonite, June 2002

Another painting from my college days. One of my first works to have a decorative/textural border around a simplified landscape. In May of 2002 as I was getting my senior show together I also started my first professional porfolio that featured my landscape work as opposed to my design work done for my senior project. This painting was one of 20 works to be in that porfolio. Right after I finished the works in July I was contacted by Sundance graphics to submitt images for consideration so the timing was perfect. This image is the one they liked the best so they wanted me to redo it with a companion and in a different format. The first paintings that resulted from this was the New Summer Road set, my first published works done in August of 2002. "New Yellow Glow" was created during the time when a painting like this was done in about a day.

 

 

MAY 2006 - "Country Glimpse" 24x24, acrylic on masonite, May 2003

One of many works that I was doing at the time which featured square landscapes with textured borders. In a conceptual way I thought these works expressed the landscape as an idea or fantasy rather than something directly experienced. This also seemed to make sense because even though landscape painting became my main concentration I was still always a studio artist. So it made sense artistically to adopt motifs and approaches that didn't attempt to always represent landscapes in a realistic way. Any realism came only from memory or imagination rather than observation or references. I also felt the faded secondary landscape expressed the notion that a place can have emotional impact if it creates a subconscious connection with a previous memory or sensation seperate from what is actually being experienced. When I finished this work along with its counterpart I was excited to submitt it to Sun Dance Graphics for publishing but they were both rejected due to it being too similar to something previously printed. To this day it still one of my favorate works with this format and I still use this approach in current works.

 

 

APRIL 2006 - "Breathing Place" 18x24, acrylic on mounted masonite, April 2002

This painting is from my college days, it was done the month before I graduated from the Minneapolis College of Art and Design. At the time I was working on my senior project which was a series of graphic designs and some illustrations. For my senior show I wanted to include some landscape paintings as well to make the exhibit more diverse so I created this one along with one other landscape. At the time I was just getting into landscape painting so I guess thats why I felt I wanted to include some in my senior show even though it doesn't really represent most of the types of work that I did while I was at MCAD. The painting is very different than most of my landscape works, mainly because at the time I was still in an experimental stage with technigue, imagery, and expression. It was mostly painted using a palette knife and only a few regular brushes, this expressionistic approach allowed me to build up lots of texture which I then applied lots of semi-transparent layers of paint mixed with medium. I even gave the painting 3 layers of acrylic varnish. The goal in the end was to create a very minimal work that was very illuministic and which had a certain glowing feel to it. The dichotomy between the atmospheric and the textural created a certain sensation which I was learning to explore as I moved towards more "painterly" painting. Like many of the landscapes that I created at that time "Breathing Place " was indirectly inspired by Lake of the Isles and some photos I that I took around that lake. The last time I saw this painting was at Espresso Expose', a coffee shop near the U of M which displayed and sold many of my paintings my senior year.

 

 

MARCH 2006 - "Luminosity" 24x36, acrylic on canvas, March 2003

One of the few paintings that I've done on canvas. This painting is one of the first paintings that I created in my more contemporary style which I developed in 2003. It expresses a more stylistic approach and rendering of the landscape with its simple shapes and composition. It was about this time that I began to render scenes in a way that depicts light with a more atmospheric and glowing feel rather than light with a specific source. I set out to create a landscape with a simple and well defined foreground, middleground and background, and where the depth is only really achieved from atmospheric perspective rather than a converging linear perspective. This approach I later used for many paintings but this one is still one of my favorates. There is nothing specific about the different shapes and styles of the trees, their purpose is more to serve the composition and the creation of movement, they also are meant to generate a feeling of illustrative fantasy and escape. "Luminosity" was also the first personal, non-commissioned painting that I sold for a $1,000 through Art Holdings in Mpls.

 

 

  

NOVEMBER 2005 - "Pink Autumn" 24x24, acrylic on masonite, November 2002

One of many paintings that I've done inspired by Lake of the Isles in Minneapolis. During autumn of 2002 most of the paintings I did were 24x24 inch square and this one incorporates more texture in the painting than most of my landscape works. When I was in college there were times I walked around the lake late at night when the light of the city reflected off the water and the misty air. Sometimes this would create a real pinkish glow that would fill the atmosphere. Although this painting dipicts the lake at sunset it was inspired by those late nights walking around the lake when it seemed to radiate.