Back to Paint

Some great master, I remember hearing, got into oil painting because he liked the smell. I've missed the smell of linseed oil, the burning, unpleasant stink of turpentine. They are the smells of a birthing room. They make me feel like something is afoot, something significant.

My dear friend Mori recently told me the story about the regrets dying people have. She said, "You don't wanna be thinking: 'Damn, should have done more art!'" And just like that I decided, that no unearthly apocalypse, let alone mundane worries about grad school and success, will stop me from making art.

Here's the start of my new painting (modeled, of course, by Mori). Painting a head feels a lot different now that I've been drawing skulls in my anatomy course. Somehow, things fall into place much smoother. And no, of course this work won't be just a portrait study! There will be a dark streak in it, just in time for Halloween.