"Rodigo" Painting

Eric and and his wife, Holly, had just moved into their new townhouse in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida and in 2003 after their recent marriage and were hosting their first dinner party at the new place. They soon realized that with a new house, comes walls. Walls need art. As the budget was tight and the time short, Eric suggested a quick trip over to a local thrift store, where he purchased a big, ugly framed picture on a canvas. He got it back to the house and took it into the garage and looked around and found a few cans of latex house paint. With no particular idea of how or what to paint, he picked up a small ceramic pot and began sloshing paint around the upside down pot on the canvas. He repeated the pattern until the piece was complete. He let it dry for about four hours and hung it in the living room. This was the spark that set Eric on his way as an abstract painter. Without a proper studio, he painted in two different garages and on a balcony over the last 20 years. In order to progress as an artist, although seemingly trite, he began his art education on Instagram. He would learn about the abstract masters like Klint, Kandinsky, Pollack, Krasner, Twombly, Frankenthaler, Rothko, Warhol and many others. It seemed obvious that each of these knew the rules in their own way and then broke them. Eric progressed into creating his own canvases from painters' tarps and scrap wood. Latex, acrylic and spray paint became his primary mediums. Brushes also gave way to using random objects as scrapers to paint with, whether it was leftover wood scraps from framing or plastic trimming from butter tubs. Coming from the graphic design world meant that compromise and corporate perfection were out the window. Upcycling framing wood from old fences or from scrap and various substrates to paint on like painters’ drop cloths, bed liners, fiberboard, plywood, as well as the use of mis-tinted latex paint from hardware stores, acrylic and spray paint became the staple mediums. He would also fashion his own decorative framing on many of the artworks. All of this coalesces into an organic and very human experience for the viewer. After painting for years for himself and friends, he moved to Albuquerque in 2009 and became immersed in an art-rich community in New Mexico and decided to throw his hat in the ring and show his works to the world. He joined the Sandia Heights Studio Art Tour in 2015 and sold over 80 pieces during that nine year span.