A gallery of paintings, accompanied by a Q&A with the artist throughout.

1. Did you grow up here in Hampton Roads? I’m a New York native, and moved to the 757 about 3 years ago. My wife and I honeymooned in Virginia Beach many moons ago, and I absolutely fell in love with this place. << Previous | Next >>

2. Are you self-taught? Totally self-taught. I always had a talent, but didn’t take it seriously until I moved here. I saw what was going on in the contemporary art movement with intricately painted cartoons and pop culture parody. And it struck me that if I learned certain things, I could make it a career. [...]

3.You’ve been featured in Juxtapoz and at Thinkspace. Why do you stay in the area? I have total peace of mind here to do whatever I want. I escaped from NY to wash the city out of my hair and chill. Moving back to a city and getting swamped in the illusion of a competitive [...]

4. Can you describe Lowbrow art in your terms? Someone once told me, “It’s amazing that you spend your life painting such random garbage with such skill and grace.” At first I was pissed, but they pretty much hit the definition of Lowbrow dead on. The movement is all about purging media, culture and societal [...]

5. How did you come to create this kind of art? I love art that holds up a mirror to expose our true beautiful imperfect selves. It’s absolutely necessary that art have a voice to say whatever it wants. Why waste precious time creating vague art that has nothing to say? << Previous | Next [...]

6.When you’re working on a canvas, are you thinking about the viewer’s response? What are you going for? Shock? Humor? I think the main goal is to paint whatever I think rocks. What’s shocking and amazing is that most everyone can relate. You can get away with virtually anything if your point isn’t written or [...]

7. What do you think your paintings say about our American, media-soaked culture? I think that we are a brainwashed consumer society. Eat, Get High, Fornicate, Sleep and Repeat those things daily till you die. I imagine the world would be healthier without the moral poisonings of the McDonald’s and Walt Disneys, but what fun [...]

8. How do you avoid stepping into a moralistic tone when inserting your personal perspective into some of these works? If someone cops an attitude because I painted a duck drinking Jack Daniels, I must be doing something right. Any art that provokes a response becomes validated and powerful. I never painted politics, and would [...]

9. There seems to be a fine line in your paintings between sending up some of these celebrities and idolizing them; for instance, Samuel L. Jackson and Jack Nicholson. What strikes you about these icons? I painted them because everyone likes them, and I could manipulate their iconography to make statements that wouldn’t be interesting [...]