Why paint trashcans?

Landscape painting is often quite serious and sincere, but it doesn’t have to be. Painting can be celebratory and playful, while still helping us examine our world. Humor, play and irreverence are important parts of my work. I enjoy combining this “serious” form of art with light-hearted, goofy or mundane subject matter. And in turn, using that playfulness as a container to examine complex or difficult questions.

Painting that addresses cultural dominance. (White anti-racist lens, anti capitalist lens). Landscape painting upholding cultural norms. On landscape painting + dominant (white) culture. Friedrich painting as reference! The trash-can is a funny stand-in for story-telling.

Decolonial landscape … landscape as abolition … what does this mean? Inheritance without obedience, knowledge without authority, coherence without force, skill without coercion. How to employ “skill” and “naturalism” without replicating colonial values/domination of place and space? Same deeper question of “Potato Does Life”. The paintings are just about asking: how do I relate to this place/space? NOT about providing a solution necessarily.

Read more: “How is Floral Painting Connected to Social Justice?”

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Written August 15th, 2024. Edited August 6th, 2026.