Distant

Distant, 2025, oil on linen, 40.5 x 50.75 cm

 

The Tao Te Ching (Way of Life), by Lao Tzu, is a book of short stanzas touching on the nature of God. 

The lines in some of the paragraphs have resonance for me because it's these qualities that should exist in art, qualities that transcend subject matter. Every painting and drawing I do I try to capture even a little of what Lao Tzu described.  Here are 2 examples.

Stanza 4, paragraph 1 - 

The way is void

Used but never filled

An Abyss it is,

Like an ancestor 

From which all things come

Stanza 14, paragraph 2 - 

...

It stretches far back

To that nameless estate

Which existed before the creation 

All Things Must Pass

 

All Things Must Pass, oil on canvas, 73.75 x 61 cm

Occasionally I make realistic paintings that are not about what we see but about an idea that applies to the world we see. I tried to paint the candle so that it sits lightly in the hand, suggesting the ephemeral nature of existence. 

I wouldn't call it a surrealist painting because this image could exist naturally. For me, surrealism is going to a personal space that doesn't behave in the same way as the real world we share.