Why paint trashcans?

Landscape painting is often quite serious and sincere, but it doesn’t have to be. I believe 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 combing this “serious” form of art (painting) with light-hearted, goofy or mundane subject matter. And in turn, using that playfulness as a container to examine complex or difficult questions (like dominance of the European lens in landscape painting)

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?”

- August 15th, 2024