"Enlightenment"-New Painting

Here's a new painting, it's 24x24 and is oil on panel. I wanted to do a painting about the elusive quality of knowledge or spiritual enlightenment as part of my Building a Life Series. Light is the perfect instrument to communicate this concept. I thought my model did a great job expressing this idea of wonderment.

International Artist Magazine-People and Figures Competition

My painting "Like Breath on Glass" is a finalist in the International Artist Magazine's People and Figures Competition-2009 in the Dec/Jan 2010 issue.

I posted this painting on facebook and a few days later there was a beautiful poem in my inbox. The painting had inspired friend and Birmingham AL poet Scott Gordon to write "Transparent Hearts". It is eerily intuitive  and I'm in awe! I've been inspired many times by literature, art and music but this is the first time that I've known one of my paintings to inspire another artist to create. Thank you Scott!

Transparent Hearts

By: Scott Gordon

bleak patterns and shade
she watches the lightning
and fears the coming rumble
this perforated horizon
will soon tear itself apart
with or without him, she decides
her fingers trace transparent hearts
on the window pane
they can sense the dancing pressure
and the condensation scramble

between the blur of buses
she sees him across the street
waiting for the light to change
hands in his pockets, eyes on the ground
framed within a tiny heart
he seems small, a universe away
who are his heroes, she wonders
and where does he keep them hidden?

The painting is 16x20, oil on panel. Here are a few details.

Thanks to my daughter for modeling on a cool winter afternoon at the outdoor Train Museum in Savannah, GA. This painting is currently at Principle Gallery in Alexandria, VA.

"Like Breath on Glass" is in this issue along with excerpts about my inspiration, design strategy and working process. The magazine is in bookstores now.