John's '55 Rumi

32"x48" oil on canvas ••• Since it appears that I will be bothering you only once this week with my art and inordinately inane commentary, I thought a larger painting somehow apropos. • This piece is 4 feet wide and made a valiant attempt at killing me. • Instead of following my usual method of painting a new subject smaller—get familiar with the nature of the person/place/thing—then taking it larger, I just jumped from the plane without a parachute and started large with this. There is no small version. • This pristine motorcycle is a piece of art in itself and all of its little details—especially the spokes—were new to me. Combine that with my method of wet-into-wet painting and engaging such finely beautiful details on a rather large scale seems... a bit... unwise. Since I use my paint straight from the tube, wet-into-wet means I have only a short amount of time until my paint starts fighting back. Even large globs of oil paint start to skin over quicker than you might think, leaving me with a limited amount of "live" time to complete a painting. Also, my direct style is not really compatible with being reworked and, quite frankly, once I am done with a painting, I'm done. Mentally I have already moved on to the next homicidal maniac of a painting. • Anyway, through the cussing and spitting, the painting and I both survived delivering the result you see above. • After that verbose, full-bodied "whine," you might think that I would never want to paint another one of these beautiful machines again, but as it is with off-kilter people like me, I'm starting to get the itch to possibly take on the challenge again.

Posted June 11, 2015