Toddlers and Tiaras

Happy Halloween (almost)! Here's a painting I did last spring, based on the regrettably popular TLC show "Toddlers and Tiaras." It's 3 feet by 2 feet on wood, so it's definitely larger than life. My intention was for it to be a commentary on the themes and values American parents are presenting to their children as desirable, and whether or not it's appropriate for their age. Obviously Toddlers & Tiaras is an extreme example, but that doesn't mean it isn't happening in smaller doses in our own houses. Additionally, what does the fact that we find such things entertaining say about us, as viewers?

Up next, "Here Comes Honey Booboo." Not seriously, but...I wouldn't rule it out as a possibility. There is nothing worse in my mind than watching a show, depicting genuine human beings, solely for the purpose of laughing at their "sad" lives.

Beware What Lies Beneath

My attempt to paint an octo-UFO. Is it sinking into the depths of the ocean or rising from the water, about to fly home? We shall never know. All a bit of silliness really.

The Street of Crocodiles

I enjoy finding stories within stories. The following drawings are based on words I pulled from the pages of The Street of Crocodiles.

his irritation was lost in a maze among his pillows, carved with distaste and his eyes spread over lonely monologues merged with smiling mouths, engrossed in his anger with ears.

he was himself only a wandering black void. we all felt that.

monsters, hissing greedily, would conjure up from nothingness these blind buds of tin branches, which flutter in the air, guided by ageless egyptian eyes.

we forgot him.

Existence

We are
This pimpled ill-conditioned
Mere excess of comfort;
Is this a dawn of a new state
Or a form of no touch torture?
For you will find we out trip
All praise and make it halt
Behind us - flaunting
Superiority even as we laud.

(So many words,
What I want but cannot say,
Come down on me at once.)

I need my pillow angel.
Ready to drop upon me
when waking, cry to dream.
Do I evade
The clogging of awareness?
Conscience.
Me:
A deeply superficial person.
I am or they are superficial.
I remain home dying my eyebrows
To measure them in inches.
Them: the metronome of society.
Flying smoothly
These depths of heights
A dream.
But shallowness deceives,
So we dumbly stare
Finding space measured
Not infinite.
The crust of our stance
Rings. Shatters
The ever opened eye,
Giving blindness, not light.
Shutting the shades.

I need never be ashamed
Though we are nothing
Longing nothing
Proud of ignorance,
For I am two with nature.