Cutting complicated stencils is not difficult. Usually I blast music or listen to the Leafs lose. The cutting part is quite relaxing. It has taught me an important lesson: that lines have two sides.
Also the trick in cutting out a stencil is that you can never complete a circle (otherwise that part falls out on the floor, damn!)
What's with the stencils?
When I left art college, I was not a comfortable painter. I was always anxious that my clumsy brush would obliterate all the detailed drawing that I had worked out. It took me FOREVER to finish a painting. Then serendipity directed me towards the idea of stencils. I realized I could preserve my drawings if I cut them out. Anytime I screwed the image up I could lay my stencil down, spray some paint through it and, voila, the drawing was back.
While cutting the stencil might take a great many hours (50? 60? 100? depends). The actual painting might take 30 seconds.
The whole idea of "stencil" appealed to me as the ultimate low tech mass media. But it was the "idea" that I could infinitely reproduce the line work that attracted me. Knowing that possibility I rarely made multiples. I became more interested in the relationship between line, paint and wood.
Eventually, I developed a truly elaborate process of preparing plywood sheets with multiple layers of enamel paint; applying the stencil using spray bombs; beating the image up with sanders and more paint; applying the stencil again...and so on. For some images I must have laid the principal stencil down between 40 and 50 times. One reviewer descirbed my process workeing as well with a belt sander as a brush!" As a hands-on guy, I will take that as a compliment.
Overall, I probably pursued stencilled imagery for close to twenty-five years. By the time I heard about Banksy, I was starting to get tired of my elbaorate, time consumng, and fume choked process. It was time for a change. But in this section, I am looking back and celebrating all that colour, texture and sawdust.
A pair of panels from the "As Seen On TV" serices. In this case my take on a "rural" legend: If you draw a line in the sand and stick a chicken's beak to the line, the poor creature will remain transfixed until you take it away. In this case the line is blue and the "chicken" is really a rooster. I sold this painting, but the owner reported that it had been subsequently stolen. Out there somewhere, doing its thing...
During my "extended" stencil phase (over 20 years), one of my dominant compositional strategies was to pitch opposites against each other in an effort to find a precarious, yet dynamic balance.
For example, many of these works are "diptychs". One panel saturated with detail and drawing energy. The other panel asserting less drawing but an aggressively saturated colour.
Two panels, each 30 in square. Spray paint through hand cut stencils on plywood prepared with liquid enamel paint.
From the As Seen On TV series. My first go round at Dolly the Cloned Lamb. In this case, she is fighting the demons of greed! Go, Dolly, Go.
From the As Seen On TV series. The title kind of says it all.
A lot of my process doing the stencils was to reveal the compelling grain naturally in the wood. Quite often this meant sanding off ten's of hours of painting to show the texture
From the series "As Seen On TV".
About the pigs in George Orwell's animal farm gaining intellecutal enhancement (and in turn, becoming authoritarian.) In this case, I have turned the whole event into a late night sci-fi feature, where the pigs gain intelligence after wearing some diabolical brain enhancing head gear.
This image of the dancing pigs returrns repeatedly over the years in other works of mine.
Most the work I did in my stencil days was on large sheets of 1/2 inch plywood, luxiurantly prepared with many layers of enamel paint. I might lay the stencil down 30 or 40 times before I got the effect that I wanted. I would use a variety of power sanders to grind away the paint that I didn't want, revealing the grain quality of the wood below. Go back in with a paint brush, lay down the stencil image again, sop up some of the image with turps, gring it away again. And so on. One reviewer observed that I was as skilled with a belt sander as with a brush. I took that as a compliment.
From a series "Three Feet from Shore"
This whole series was based on a natural science book that I found in my grandmother's house.
Published in Philidelphia in 1885. The remarkable thing about the book was that it purported that everything in it was scientific fact. It treated more conventionally known facts about nature - such as how sunfish nest - equally with deadpane seriousness descriptions of monsters. Like the Kraken. I was captivated by the florrid quality of the Victorian illustrations.
What mysteries lurk just a few feet from shore!
From the Three Feet from Shore series.
Some kind of hybrid horned beast tries to escape pursuing wolves by venturing out on thin ice.
Two panels, each 2.5 ft. x 4 ft. Spray paint through hand cut stencils on plywood prepared with liquid enamel paint.
From the The Three Feet From Shore Series. In the left panel, a pike is snagging a barn swallow. Clearly asserted by the text book as a regular occurence in 1885. I would put a contemporary toonie down that says that here is no way that a pike could grab a barn swallow swooping in at over 20 mph.
Abundance. An exhibition where I explored the concept of idealized, unattainable food.
From the series "Abundance"
From the series "Abundance"
From the series "Abundance"
From the series "Abundance"
From the series "Abundance". Much of the inspiration for this series was the idea of food "porn" - something the Globe riffed on in the review of the show. Something about "unattainable" food presented to us in various gourmet magazines and cooking shows. While most of the world goes hungry. In this case, the ulimate, most decadent ice cream dessert.
