"Modern Day Religion" Series

"Modern Day Religion"

This world is filled with some many problems, but there are aspects of society within this country, which the people hold in high regard, aspects, which make this nation, in their eyes, the best country in the world. These aspects include the ideas of democracy, knowledge, freedom, free speech, justice, and equality. My goal with this series of paintings is to illustrate how these ideas have become a sort of modern day religion; ideals we praise. Hidden within these ideals though are elements of evil. They construct a system filled with flaws. Images of holy figures that appear dark and menacing, in addition to images of demons embodying the freedoms this country grants every individual, create a mythology of the good and bad of modern day society. This set of work is meant to illustrate that, which we praise in this society, while at the same time shedding light on the evil that lingers, unseen by the masses.

"Gods of Today"

"Demons of Speech"

"Angels: Equality and Justice"

going away

It's that time again. I'm going away to camp for seven weeks so I probably wont be posting on here. I'm still working on the "watch it all burn series". I plan to make them into paintings this fall.

watch it all burn

The media seems to have an obsession with the end, the destruction of the world as we know it. From zombie movies and post apocalyptic futures to the message of doom in the news. We wanna see it all destroyed, we wanna start over, and to see this through we fantasize about watching all we know burn.

This notion will be the inspiration for a coming series of drawings. Stay posted.

Second Semester Senior: a review

     So as my undergrad career comes to a close I want to take a moment to reflect on the past few months of my life.
     The semester went along just like any other, classes I enjoyed and classes I fucking hate at this point. But when it's all said and done I learned a lot. Even though my methods of sociology class was far from comfortable, I enjoyed researching the role public and private schools play in impacting one's art knowledge.
     Art after 1945 had some interesting moments. I don't hate Pollock nearly as much anymore, in fact I really hate Jasper Johns and I cannot look at the work of Sherrie Levine's work without thinking "what the fuck? you took pictures of copies of pictures, where's the talent in that?" We are taught in grade school that art equals talent and than you take a course on modern art and realize, now its just about who can bullshit the most about the latest psycho-freudian-sexist babble.
     Intermediate painting was a lot of fun. I finally found my style. It needs some work but I'm pleased with what I turned out this semester.
     As for my senior seminar, I finally completed a comic! well at least the first chapter, even then its not finished. But hey I'm finally experimenting with something I've always wanted to do. It's got my head spinning with tons of story ideas, and who knows, maybe that'll be what I do as an "artist".
     I'm still not sure what I'm going to do about grad school. My plan coming into college was to become a professor, but maybe I'll head into animation, or I could go back to the high school plan of being an art teacher and inspire the next generation of great thinkers.
     As far as fraternity life goes, I really removed myself for the house this semester by spending every free moment I had in the studio. But lately I've been hanging around a little more. I've realized that even though there may be moments of immaturity that really annoy me, I used to be that way, and I wouldn't have grown in to the person I am today if I hadn't joined that crazy group of guys.
     All in all it's been a fun four years here, but that time is coming to an end. It's time for me to pack up and move on with my life. Hopefully that includes finding a good paying job, buying a car, and moving in with the love of my life, Jackie.

Accomplishments and important dates:
-Got published in the Mercury again
-Had "Gods of modern day society" triptych and "Graffiti artist" in the Jurried Student Exhibition
-Illustrated a poster for the Precious Souls book series (just finished it on Tuesday)
-Senior show opening reception is at 5pm on May 2nd and the lunch talk is on Thursday the 3rd at noon.
-The show for my painting class opens on May 3rd with an opening reception at 4:30pm.
-Graduation day is May 20th

-Then the real world begins...not really considering I'm hiding from it by working at summer camp one last time.

Here's some pretty pictures!

Graffiti Artist

Gods of Modern Day Society - triptych

Madonna of Cobalt

The Tinman - comic cover

Depth

So I've decided on a title for my 'underwater zombie' idea. But I'm thinking it wont really be a "zombie" story. Still playing around with the idea. Hopefully I'll have a basic plot figured out in the next week or two.

late night sketch

Here's a tattoo idea I thought of. It's inspired by "the escape artist" by august burns red. Here's a link to the song (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bJhOJoc_Vbk). When I listen to the song the lyrics seem to weigh down on me. They confront the issue of judgement within the christian faith, and how more often than not, Christians will push someone away because they do not have an open mind, rather an open mouth. People do not take the time to get to know someone before they judge them. this is something everyone is guilty of, not just Christians.

burial at sea

What happens to the bodies buried at sea?

I'm playing around with this idea and how it could be applied to zombies. 

Could turn into an interesting story.