February 2006- Click here to see the creation of this work.

The original idea for this was exactly what you see here, but off in the shadows to the right of the chair was a giant cat (my cat Bernini). It was too fantastic, so I opted for this more reserved version. I was interested in making a self portrait without actually having "myself" in it. At the time I felt inseparable from my work because there was little dividing my personal life from my professional one (This is one of the pitfalls of making very personal work) because I was obsessing over my painter's block and loss for ideas. Still frustrated by it, I decided to revisit a successful image from my past, the painting of my studio chair from college. My chair has recently been featured in my paintings, but only as an essential piece of studio furniture, however in this work the chair plays an important role once again. Chairs are powerful stand-ins for people and can have just as much presence as the person themselves. This is attested to in countless stories and paintings. Who can forget the ghost of Christmas Future's vision of Tiny Tim's little empty stool, or Van Gogh's chair for himself and the one for Gauguin? In the case of Van Gogh, his chairs were expecting sitters, where my chair doesn't. I wanted to add some tension to offset my smiling face by suggesting I have madly jumped into or away from my work by toppling the chair. I was also counting on any associations one might have with overturned chairs in a basement like environment. Painter's block sucks. I think I might have a solution to it though. The Spring. I don't think painter's block was really what I was suffering from . I believe it was simply the winter blues because I can already feel a resurgence of energy and the promise of new ideas as the days get progressively longer. I suspect this is the case also because I noticed I am beginning to enjoy my books again. Maybe I will revisit Crime and Punishment. I really felt like titling this piece after the book, and maybe someday I will.