Original 5 models and basic concept in Moleskine

22nd & Treat – 9×12 charcoal and pastel on tones paper

Naomi – 9×12 charcoal on paper

Crystal – 9×12 charcoal on toned paper

Kat – 9×12 charcoal and pastel on paper

Ms. Miller – 9×12 charcoal and pastel on toned paper

Marissa – 9×12 charcoal and pastel on paper

Stella – 10×15 charcoal and pastel on paper

Nobody Can Save You But Yourself – 10×14 oil on linen

Wild Hearts Can’t Be Broken – 13×14.5 oil on panel

Ever since I can remember I’ve wanted to be able to draw and paint in a realistic manner. To be able to fill up a sketchbook with drawings of people and have them actually look like the person. I wanted to be the best. As a kid, I would never have imagined that this would be possible in bursts of time and that I would be able to take great leaps and learn to adapt as quickly….

For the longest time, I’ve been mainly working in pencil. Like most artists, this is the tool you start with and stay with forever. You can veer from it from time to time, but inevitably, most artists will always go back to the pencil. In the instances when I veered, I went to charcoal or ink. I stayed in a monochromatic state for years until I got to college, where I was forced to go outside the zone and was challenged constantly to use color in ways I had had only seen in books or a museum. It was in college that I learned to use oil paints. They were very foreign to me and I didn’t know what to make of them. I used them now and again in college, but never really showed an interest in them until later in life.

Fast forward to 2012 I was using a lot of acrylic and mixed media to create works, but I wasn’t feeling challenged enough and I wasn’t feeling like my works were making much of an impact. I decided on a whim to get a few new supplies at the art store – small canvas, paint solvents and medium, and oil paints. Ivory Black, Titanium White and Burnt Umber were the only colors I got since I had some reservations on making a spur of the moment judgment and taking a big leap, but decided that it wouldn’t hurt to give it a shot.

I came up with a simple idea of having some friends and models pose in front of textured, old, decrepit walls and buildings decorated in graffiti or chipped paint and rust. Buildings and backgrounds that were seasoned/weathered, that had character to them. Some friends agreed to model for me and we went out to a few places I knew of that fit my particular aesthetic. I took a few hundred reference photos of them in various locations and eventually with different models to suit my needs and add diversity. Before long, I was visiting different cities in the country with new and old friends taking thousands of photos in new locations and establishing more connections with something that started out as a small idea….

Previous posts: Prologue, Overture Vol. II , Overture Vol. III