My first “Prestigious” studio visit..

I was very closed off from showing my work in late 2017-2018, and took a year off of posting content online. Now listen I’m a firm believer in the magic that happens in real time, the real material world, although I can see the benefit of sharing your work online. I was even more closed off with showing my face. So yeah with that groundwork let me tell you about my very first “prestigious” studio visit.

It was the late summer of 2018 I recently started to get settled in to my new space and I was creating everything from wood sculpture to paintings everyday. During this time I wanted to see what all the hype was about so I ventured out to every gallery I saw by walking in Brooklyn and Manhattan by myself. I wore “simple folk” clothes, black shirt, grey sweatpants, off brand shoes. I was severely unimpressed by the art here and I still am. I thought this was the place you go if you’re an Artist and you want to make it big! You want to challenge yourself with all the things happening around you! Honestly the only thing that has inspired me is some of the people I’ve met here,visiting from other places, and a special someone who continues to inspire me. So as I began to fill the void of lack inspiration and lowered expectations in glittering white spaces with alcoholic beverages, red wine in particular, in said gallery spaces. I began to feel a numbness to the art, because that’s what I believed the work was representing on the walls, absolute plutocrat numbness, the wealth from dying old people duct taped to the white walls of the highest honor of our civilization. So I begin to talk to the people there to see what they think. Colours this composition that, oh do you know so-en-so, a lot of art jargon if you ask me. I ran into a curator who asked me, “so what do you do”. Did I have a cape on or was I in tattered robes trying to figure out why am I uninspired? Now I get this question so much what’s the point of even going to gallery shows. People just want to meet interesting people, who LOOK interesting because the art isn’t interesting, it reeks of a seeping rebellious creative fear, and I can smell it all the way from back home.

Now in my mind, my hour glass ticks I’m “young”, I want a family of my own, I smell blood in the water and I say simply I’m a painter and you should check out my work in person if you’re really interested, (y’know to cut out all the bullshit). The curator agreed and contacts were exchanged. A couple of weeks go by and I’m focused on my work and haven’t thought twice about it because everyone I’ve made contact with that week seemed to function like a bad date, no matter how straightforward I was about who I was and what I did. So I get a call and I’m available of course because I’m working nonstop between March 2018 and December 2018. I go downstairs to meet the curator, what followed were comments about my unorthodox neighborhood, funny. These art people sware I live in the swamp somewhere eating fried chicken like only a particular specific group of people eat fried chicken, oh how debonaire. I enter the code to the building and we head upstairs to check out some art. Immediately I’m met with admiration, “oh my god” “this is the best work I’ve seen”, the glasses come off and the eyes stare sharply into my artwork. Some adoration continues and five minutes later it’s literally nothing but racial slurs and hate for the next five minutes. I watched this persons’ internal battles wage war right in front of my glossy eyes, with me and my artwork caught in the crossfire. I was incited by this person to harm them for the hatred that took place. I felt no anger I felt pity for this soul, the mask was confronted by something real and a reaction couldn’t be hidden behind a computer screen. This classless savage that’s in control of getting Artist in well-renowned Manhattan galleries is what my art is about, “Apes in Glitter” and I learned just as much from this person, and this experience as I would any other person. I don’t understand why people think the art world is so sophisticated. It’s actually behind in my eyes along with many other creative industries.