askewone:

askewsmokesignals:

While I was doing the Fountainhead residency in Miami, we would divide our days like this: Morning - bike ride or drive over to Panther Coffee in Wynwood to get our caffeine fix. Then - paint outdoors for the majority of the day. Evening - eat, shower and then head to Little Haiti where the studio was.

I had a sudden burst of inspiration, my epiphany moment while working on the Thunderclap Headache painting and knew what I wanted to create for the rest of the series almost instantly. It was like a lightning flash in my mind. Coincidentally, there was a little lightning cloud situated over the studio building 2 nights in a row as we approached it. I made the joke that it was the “Lightning Over Little Haiti’ that was fueling my inspiration. It had a ring to it so it was the next painting I started right after the Thunderclap Headache.

The idea for the stacked type configurations started way back with my Help Stuck On A Crazy Island illustration I had done for a T-Shirt design back in 2007. I had always wanted to return to this but knew it had to be more evolved that just black line work like the original. My breakthrough with my painting technique really gave the whole idea a new lease.

Lightning Over Little Haiti, 2011/2012
Acrylic, enamel, vinyl paint, waterborne glaze
2500 x 1900mm
$15,000 (NZD)