
Solaris
This acrylic painting, "Solaris" is named after its look which loosely resembles a sunflower.
I find it satisfying to combine the look of a flower with the look of the cosmos or something from the stars or the universe.
The mandala composition once again, allows a straightforward and easy direction for the painter to fall into.
The fact that everything really centers around the middle of the square image provides an opportunity to explore patterns, colors, and juxtapositions of colors.
I enjoy exploring other compositions, but perhaps I'm a bit hedonistic in my desire and gravitation to paint, because I very much enjoy the satisfying feeling of placing paint on a canvas, and watching the painting unfold as it does.
My hedonism is facilitated and enabled when I have the mandala composition to fall back into.
The mandala never fails in allowing me to paint and saturate a surface with a variety of different. patterns.
The beautiful thing about mandalas is you don't know entirely how it's going to look when you start or even when you're halfway through.
With Solaris, I started to outline an underlaying group of marks with a sort of flower pedal design, and then I painted darker colors around that to allow the underpainting to remain, while the painting juxtaposed around that changed.
The only way I can really allow myself to explore different ways of making patterns, and ultimately explore painting is if I adhere to a reliable composition such as the mandala.
I think people look at my work, and they say - oh it's celestial, or it's "cosmic" or it's "psychedelic", but I feel that dismisses a large chunk of the process and almost writes off what it really is - it is an exploration of visual phenomenon for the purpose of play and integrating a relationship of mark making.