"Shrimp Boats" for The Compound Gallery's Art in a Box.

Sometimes random projects outside of my own art present themselves. Here's an interesting one. I was asked to make a 16 x 9ft WPA style mural for a new restaurant. Farmworkers harvesting corn and a triumphant brewer turning it into beer. Being a fan both of the WPA era style, and of working large, I took it on. So far its been a fun challenge to work in a more representational style for the first time in a long time. Here's the progress so far:

Sonoma County is one of my favorite parts of the world, and as luck would have it, I have several opportunities to show and make art there over the next couple of months.



Baker's Dozen at Quicksilver Mine Company, Forestville CA is an annual themed group show and incudes a piece of mine this year. The show runs January 20—February 26, 2012 with an artist's reception January 21, 4 to 6pm.
quicksilvermineco.com

Duration at Gallery Route One, Point Reyes Station CA. Two pieces in this show juried by Andea Schwartz. January 27th to February 19th, reception Sunday January 29th, 3-5pm.
galleryrouteone.org

A New Leaf Gallery, Sonoma - several piece in the current group show.
sculpturesite.com

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Happy New Year everyone!

Here's a new piece that's in the Bacchinae show at Zza's in Oakland. I did a lot of camping earlier in the year and made a lot of pictures of tents. Recently the image of tents, especially in groups, has come to mean so much more I thought I'd play around with it a little. Its the enduring image of 2011!

I did a big piece of paving as a commission for the remodelling of the Coddigtown Mall in Santa Rosa back in 2008. The piece was well recieved but due to the recession, the construction didn't move onto its next phase. That is until this year, and I'm very happy to have been commissioned to do two more entry pieces, about 2000 sqft in total. I started on the first area in early November and should finish the whole thing by Christmas. The weather has been largely co-operative so far so I hope it stays that way.

The original concept was derived from looking at satellite photos of the agricultural land north of Santa Rosa, in particular the way that the man-made geometry of fields and roads interacts with rivers. I developed ...

Under The Moonlight, The Serious Moonlight

Encuentro is a great little wine bar/cafe in the Jack London Square area of Oakland. I have a selection of work old and new hanging there until mid-January. Peruse the art and sample some of their incredible food.

encuentro 202 2nd Street (@Jackson) Oakland http://www.encuentrooakland.com

A few new pieces. I decided to work on several unfinished pieces I had and some older pieces that needed to be reworked. Consequently, They're an odd assortment of images rather than a coherent and connected set, but that's an appropriate way for them to work out and it feels quite refreshing. The "unfinished and rework" pile is still pretty large so expect more of these later.

Little by Little 30 x 36

Occupado 54 x 42

Work Song 30 x 36

I'm taking these pieces down to Art From The Ashes' "Artists Support Japan" show in Culver City. A 48 x 24 mixed media piece "Wade in the Water II" with reclaimed tin and metal in amongst the cement, pigment etc, and a fleet of "Fishermen's Wishes" sardine-can boats.

Read more about Art From The Ashes and the show in the previous posting. It looks like its going to to be a great show with an amazing line-up of artists.

   Fishermen's Wishes

  Some of the fleet

"My recent body of work follows a trip I made to the Senegalese coast where I became very aware of the timeless way of life centered around the ocean. People bathed in the water, worked in ............