It was food or paint and paint won out!

At this very second with the exception of a bit of loose change and a couple bucks in quarters I'd intended for laundry, I am flat broke. Some how over the course of storing everything at my parents and then moving to Seattle, all of my oil paints went missing. That's probably around $4,000 in paints, brushes and canvas. I'm still pretty devastated over the whole thing as many of the colors that were among my favorite in that bag are now outlawed for production in the united states, including my cadmiums, which were the staples of my palette. I've got absolutely no idea how to replace my oil paints. The fact is really I can't, I've just got to make do and slowly replenish my stocks over time.

So today I took a bus down to Daniel Smiths and spent $162.06 on seven tubes of paint, three brushes, a bottle of poppy seed oil, a can turpenoid, and a palette knife. I then came home and grabbed my last eleven dollars in bills, dipped into my laundry money, and spent it all on a pizza and bread sticks from dominos. I realize I could have possibly gotten something cheaper, like ramen from a package, but if I want real groceries I'd have to ride an hour on the bus to the grocery store and I'm not in the mood for that. Now I realize this is going to seem ridiculous for a lot of people, not the pizza because that's always awesome, but I having been dying to paint for months now. I've got all of these images screaming to get out of my head and I just need to paint!

I have a show on thursday so I'm hoping the work from that will sell but if not life's a bitch and then you die. My hope is just that I'm able to sell some work and be able to buy food, pay rent and keep making art work. I'm applying for a job driving a bus for the King Country Metro and another driving buses for the airport incase nothing sells. The works I'm showing are the photo collages from my BFA show, which was back in 2008, its pretty humiliating not to having anything recent to show. I just couldn't be this humiliated next month, I HAVE to have a series of recent works to show. I had to buy those oil paints, I couldn't just have that canvas all prepared, ground colored and ready, sitting there mocking me. I have to complete this painting and how myself and everyone else that I WILL make it as an artist.

My intention is to do a series of oil paintings about visual metaphors. Its not the most high brow thing I've ever done but I just need to start cranking out work for now and worry about being a great genius once I've found my momentum. The picture is of the canvas I'm getting ready to paint.