What is he thinking? My great effort here was to make him look obviously not dead. He looks to me like he’s thinking hard about something, like maybe all the things he was supposed to get done.

I can’t help how thrilled I am about all of the accidents that become a painting. I have the best conversations with my models. Last night Greg said, “once you decide to leave them there, they’re no longer accidents, they’re deliberate.” !!! However, in this painting, the lighting, indeed his entire face, is an accident.

Here’s the thing that really works in this painting...the ground plane. Although the background is totally white, the figure-ground space has been believably created. This man is laying on the ground. There is perspective and space. There is weight and mass. There is flesh. There is process and form and the search for form. There is respect, and then there is the slapping of wet paint on canvas and against meat. The body is thrown down on the ground with force as the paint is thrown down on the canvas the flesh is built. And the accident is violent.

uuhh! Thawhump! That’s the feeling in my solar plexus when I look at this painting.

Please understand, I don’t own this work. I didn’t paint it. It paints itself. I’m not there. And when I step away, I’m a spectator like anyone else. So, I don’t mean to sound inappropriate, or vain when I analyze the work this way. I’m just excited by this piece. Perhaps even more so in contrast to the last chainsaw painting that had me frustrated.

Additionally, The night before I painted Naked Shotgun. I got the rough in and I wanted to stop. I want to paint a wall of these from rotating angles and then throw the red paint at them for the installation with Paul McKee we’re talking about doing together. I think it’s beautiful just like that!

Funny thing is, the first time through, I forgot to put his cigarette in the painting. I had to add it the next night. I had to think about it overnight, whether or not it really made a difference. I decided it does. The blood-gasm reference to post-coital relief was important and needed to remain.