The Empty Visual Discourse of a Reluctant Pop Surrealist Painting

My preoccupation with cultural cues directing my message is most prominently exemplified by my commentary on consumerism. Personifying this dynamic of commerce and our perpetual need to accumulate things—the act of consumption has taken a symbolic role in my paintings embodied by characters with voracious appetites, orally “consuming” whatever may been within grasp. By presenting the characters of my stories this way, there is an allowance for ambiguity, which could steer the viewer into an introspective direction of their own. They may perceive my characters as emblematic of greed or of gluttony, triggered by their own idiosyncratic cues and experience but equally a valid reading of the painting. I don’t want the conversation to be one-sided—I want the viewer to be a participant in the active role of interpreter, in essence taking a part in the creation on an abstract level. Is the man taking candy from the baby or is he giving candy to the baby? Depending on your circumstances and frame of mind, I want both to be correct. I don’t want what I do to be some pedantic finger wagging, or heavy-handed admonishment of our culture, but I do want to leave the viewer/participant with open-ended questions—something to take away to ponder, something to bring back in question when they revisit a painting.