Broken Mind 3
I have been working on a pattern for a very long time where one abstract drawing feeds into the next. By feeding I mean I am working on a piece and there is an aspect to it that I want to explore more. In this case, I had spent a lot of time on a drawing I was calling ‘Notes on a Broken Mind #2’. In that work, I think I was trying to draw hell. There was a weight to it. I wanted it to feel like the viewer was looking down on a landscape. I didn’t want the landscape to be a city or a place for humans, just hell.
When I approach an abstract artwork, I am always thinking about rules. Maybe that is why I am drawn to Brice Marden, a man who spent his entire life constraining himself with his made up rules. For myself, the rules are great, but I don’t want to have to go beyond one work with them. For this work, the rules are that this is an abstract painting that is also affected by gravity. The shapes are purely abstract shapes, they might look like a city, but I’m trying to not depict a city.
The biggest influences on why I am working like this are:
Sid Mier - Civilization 3
So many videogames from the mid 90’s onward have relied heavily on this ‘god’ view of the world where there is no horizon line.
Haydon - Triumph of the Willing 2023
The artist Haydon has done a good job of…
Benny Fountain - Hermits Wealth 2025
Fountain, a local Portland based artist has had some great perspectives in his recent landscapes. I remember seeing this work and wanting to…
End of Session 12
At this point I took some time to reassess where this was going..
Currently, I plan to add some larger shapes to break up the space and to start coloring/using thin oil paint techniques.
