Bluntly put, I just paint.

As I see it, it’s not how you create, but rather what you create and the emotional response you can evoke from your viewer. This is what I strive to do with my work. I find that favoring a more free, open minded, experimental approach to creating leaves my imagination to its own devices and gives it the ability to assist my painting to flow in any direction it may want to go free from the restraints of holding to an existing image.

I'm not out to shock with my work but rather stir. Stir a feeling, a past experience, a reminder of that one event that has attached itself to any particular viewers psyche and to touch the viewer in a relatable way. I try and achieve this through juxtaposition combing the foreign unappealing presents of my unique characters and the familiar empathy we all feel towards any sentient being.

Contemplating retirement in 2018 from a lifelong career as a graphic designer and being held back by creating for others what they found to be art, I picked up a brush and began to paint for myself. Really paint. Paint without the cushion of an “Undo” button as was afforded to me during a life behind a computer screen. Being a conscientious person, I chose as my primary platform for my creations to be acrylic paint on recycled poly board advertising signage destine for a land fill. I then inundated myself with as many different artist I could and slowly began to find my taste through the inspiration of several east European surrealists. So in 2019 with the prodding and support of my muse and wife, I decided to shed my corporate shell and pursue a newly discovered passion full time.

I have since a child been interested in art of any kind from sketching to 3D structures. I hold no degrees. I studied under no one but rather have taught myself through lengthy trial and error, all the skills I hold today both in my artistic and personal life. I employ a number of techniques and styles that I have adapted and use whenever the situation calls for it. I find that if something is not working or just doesn’t feel right, I wont force my hand but rather allow the painting to govern my subsequent actions and simply help it to unfold as it will.

I typically won’t paint what already exists. Trying to do this through photos or on site, in my eyes, would do an injustice to the natural perfection of our world and the life it supports. For this I have chosen to create my own world and all that reside therein free from laws of nature, parameters of color, form guidelines and the preconceived notions of how life should look.

Whenever I catch myself thinking “That doesn’t look right“, I simply respond, “According to whom?”.

I hope you enjoy my creations, the world which surrounds them and all the similarities they hold with our own.

-trent