Art Instruction Blog
Preaching to the Choir
Congratulations! If you're reading this, that means you're a member of the choir. We are the choir But are we just going to stand there and sing pretty? We are not sheep! What are we willing to DO to bring about real change in the world we are sharing? Sure, art makes...
The Avant Garde vs Everyone Else?
In recent years, Charleston has discovered the Avant Garde. It is very liberating when this freedom of expression comes to a city. Charleston is lucky to have great people and institutions leading the movement. City Gallery and Redux come to mind right away. More and...
Portrait of Rocky
Rocky Lives! To celebrate Rocky's twelve years (and counting) on this Earth, Mary and Gren, his mom and dad, decided to have an oil portrait. Love, devotion, fondness don't begin to describe the feelings this animal has engendered from his family. I'm sure they would...
Start with the Idea
"Find the art in yourself, not yourself in the art." Constantin Stanislavski People often tell me they really want to be an artist and ask me what they should do to become successful. Most of them have stars in their eyes and are looking at me to feed their ego. "Do...
Change the Award System – Empower Artists
As a promised followup to my recent Artfields 2017 wrap up I would like to share some radical ideas about the award system in art competitions that I think might lead to truly empowering artists in our society. If we really want artists to be the mirror of society...
ARTFIELDS 2017
Art as an Interruption Artfields 2017 was, as always, an inspiring experience. Cate and I love going to Lake City, SC and talking about the meaning and role of art in our society. I strongly believe Artfields and the other mega award shows, like ArtPrize in Grand...
A Common Vision
When I was president of WCCAHH I noted there were over 600 arts organizations in Wayne County, many with very similar missions and visions. I wondered how we could get them to combine efforts and resources to create a more meaningful impact on the community. That...
Drawing Through Tears
Tragically, most people are more interested in what Roof is going to say or do. "how is he reacting?" But the real stories are those of the survivors. So today, my focus is really on the amazing people, over 8 witnesses thus far, who are survivors, family and friends,...
Prayer of Redemption
Today was a juxtaposition of shocking evidence that Roof had written another manifesto in prison, drawing Nazi symbols on his shoes, shoes he was wearing in court as recently as this week. This was interspersed between more beautiful and moving testimony about the...
CSU Progress Report
I must admit I was a little nervous going in, but my adjunct professorship at Charleston Southern University has been a true pleasure for me. Not only are the Drawing 1 & 2 students eager learners but they are some of the most gentle, fun-loving students I've...









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Exhausted but exhilarated having made a couple paintings during the first ever Charleston Plein Air competition at Mary Martin Gallery. The St Phillips painting was sold on the spot at the gallery as I was turning them in today to this nice couple. Talk about fresh art?! The Pineapple Fountain with City Gallery behind, is a view we don't often see. ...
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"Last Tango in Wonderland" is another collaboration with Nick C. Cerrato in which I painted what was behind his abstract expressionistic painting, which happened to be We the People of the world, being danced upon by the Epstein class. ...
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When this happens, it's usually because the owner only shared it with a small group of people, changed who can see it or it's been deleted.Day one of the MMG plein air festival in Charleston. A pretty ambitious painting of St Philip. ...
"Evil's Place," another collaboration with my dear friend and great artist, Nick C. Cerrato. ...
"Tempus Fugit" captures the instant fire and ice meet, when strange entities are released into the human psyche. Another collaboration between myself and artist Nick C. Cerrato. ...