Whom Does the Art Serve?

Art is generally understood as a form of self expression. That is the defining factor in distinguishing art from artifice. It’s why artists write artist’s statements, and it’s what artists are taught to do. But the alienation of the artist from society means that their expression will be abrasive. It will challenge the status quo, hence the term “avant garde”, the cutting edge.

We live in very comfortable times, and the art buying class of Americans live in cultural bubbles in which cutting edges are most unwelcome. Those who reject the system are relegated to the periphery, tattoo artists, street artists, rappers. The marketable artists are producing soft, fluffy, pastel “content”; like Thomas Kincaid, Shepard Fairey, and Taylor Swift. An emoji hand raised to fight the power. Palatable neoliberal progressivism, empty gestures of polite dissent.

Academic realist painters juxtapose images in still lifes for narrative effect. Usually to suggest socially palatable, progressive values. A silk necktie on a dead fish to represent the absurdity of late stage capitalism. A bikini on rotary telephone to represent third wave feminism. A bird perched on someone’s head with its tail over their face. Cute and socially acceptable metaphors. They are marketable to psuedo-intellectuals as quirky home décor, to match the coffee table books of famous photographers and architects. Am I envious of such artists? Yes, of course, but maybe the criticism is valid nonetheless.

For me, I’ve painted professionally for fifteen years or more. Yet, I remain relatively unknown outside of a very small part of the Carolina Sandhills. Even then, I’m not so much known for me as for my work, and my work’s really not me at all. And maybe when we perform a role for long enough, it becomes sincere. I think Bob Ross may have been that way, he sort of accepted the yoke of his television character. I keep my personality, my sincerity, compartmentalized. I try to save my memories for when I’m older, for when I’m well known enough that folks might pay attention. But I get older every year, and I realize that if I’m ever well known it will be impossible to divorce myself from the image I’ve manufactured. So maybe I should let my hair down...but I’ll have to grow it back first.

I’ve been sleeping poorly for the past week or so, and that always puts me in more of a dour mood than usual. So, today I was scouring reddit, and the equally spurious reddit aggregator GPT, for information on the state of social media. My Instagram account has stagnated for the past couple of years and my view counts are beginning to decrease rather than grow. I’ve tried doing cutesy Tik-Tok style walk-ins, painting reveals, pop music, etc. I’ve stopped short of actually using Tik-Tok, but I’m trying all the puerile antics that platform has spawned.

First I thought it may have been a “soft ban”, in which the algorithm represses reach to non-followers. I removed any nude images. Instagram allows artistic non-photographic depictions of nudity, but because the corporations payment processors insist on censorship for legal reasons, they take no chances. I saw this on Bluesky, which censors directly, and on that platform even the most innocuous suggestion of a disrobed human is hidden from view. Nudity is definable and can be filtered, but social deviance is harder to quantify.

We don’t seek out art because art is uncomfortable, it’s challenging. Instead, we have AI generated imagery, and if want to decorate our walls, we can have anything printed on demand. When I sell paintings people often buy them because of the colors and the materials. The most successful artists in my league find a successful formula and repeat it. They become quite good at it, and it allows them to occupy a safe niche. They can collaborate with other artists because they’re the only one who paints still lifes of refrigerators, pastel angels in tutus.

I looked upon my works and despaired today. Because, there’s no consistency. I paint traditional plein air, portraits, kitsch landscapes, various types of abstracts, all sizes, all different surfaces. I even used to paint political cartoons before AI made that unnecessary. Even my technique varies considerably. People ask me what style I paint in and I never really know how to answer. I used to say that I painted for the market, but that’s not entirely true. If I were just trying to earn money, I’d just stick to a formula like everyone else. But, I try to find something that interests me no matter the subject.

For example, I recently painted a large image of NASCAR driver Jimmie Johnson on pit row. His wife owns one of the most prominent galleries in Charlotte, so I want to sell it on principle even if I don’t earn much for it. I actually enjoyed painting it, as I did some of the beach scenes I’ve painted. They allow for symbolism and a degree of self expression

When I was a child I loved playing with toy soldiers and staging battles, then I drew pictures of trebuchets and siege engines when I was an adolescent. Even into adulthood I tried to paint scenes of battles, like my painting of St. Joan at Orleans. But grisly scenes of battle aren’t very marketable as home décor, but beach scenes are! It’s not that I like war, I think it’s absurd and stupid. But, the conflict, the tension, is what makes life meaningful. Likewise, the suggestion of tension is what makes paintings compelling. It can be a tire change on a NASCAR track, the leaves on a tree, the reflection in a window, some form of conflict makes a good painting.

Conflict may be what’s missing in the art market. I’m an extraordinarily conflict-averse person, so I observe this with utmost compassion. Conflict isn’t about skull designs and political statements. It’s not about wearing a keffiyeh or a MAGA hat. It’s about taking off our hats, our crosses, our clothes, and our conditioning and just being honest with ourselves. For me, that’s not very glamorous or pretty.

Self Portrait (2025)

My latest self portrait depicts me as a medieval knight with a Templar helmet and mail hauberk behind me. A page is lifting a linen tunic over my head. The window to the left suggests the intuitive principle, and it certainly guided the painting. The white shirt, to me, suggested a nun’s habit but also a funeral shroud. I tried to convey a look of grave acceptance in my countenance, as though a knight preparing to fight an impossible foe. To accept the habit of a nun or a shroud, forsaking even gender identity and life itself. And then I painted the folds to suggest horns. And I realized that the white cloak and pointed helmet suggested the shameful history of the south.

The figure of the page behind me is dressed in blue, suggesting the priestly class or kohenim, and in that sense it also represents the current situation in the middle east. For me, it represents how being sincere in my heritage means accepting the evils of the past. It means following Arjun’s path in the story of Krishna. It represents the reluctant Christ at Gethsemane, facing the bitterness of the sins of the world; the sins of European colonialism. It represents the paradoxical nature of conflict, and the idea of the true conflict being the one within in the psyche.

As in the self portrait, a knight preparing for battle, my painting practice has remained like a naked knight in the safety of a castle. I’ve been planning to paint an image of Gawain and the Lion in the Castle of Wonders. I’ve struggled, maybe more than most, with stabilizing my self image; my imago. As a young man, I tried desperately to appear composed and confident. I tried to do what I thought was expected of me. Now, I find that I’m unwittingly doing that with my paintings. I intend to work towards my own liberation, and art is the “cutting edge” to break those chains.

I don’t think that artistic liberation means painting with the intent to shock or to be crass or lewd. I think the intention is more about directly exploring the intent itself, and being actively engaged with the work. The subject and style of the painting could be anything, NASCAR drivers, pastel flowers, it doesn’t matter. But the important factor is the single-minded desire to engage with the subject. It’s unfair of me to denounce all genre painters, because I think some of them understand this. Some of them, maybe most of them, truly resonate with their paintings. For me it is different.

To take the battle metaphor further, knights who sparred with the same opponent for years would be easily defeated by unconventional tactics. Left handed swordsmen were notoriously effective, and the history of Rome was marred by the Scythians and the Picts who were known for unconventional methods. So it is when painters fall into routine. It’s easier, it’s pleasant, it’s marketable, but it’s stagnant and it does nothing for society. Great painters have always pushed themselves, and experimented.

In my portrait, I am accepting the mantle, the habit of divine duty. But my eye is looking aside. I will continue to engage with the market. I will continue to produce social media content, keep up such social courtesies as are necessary, but I will never stop testing the boundaries. It is the duty of an artist to defy their own proclivities. Roses are red, violets are purple. My method’s artistic, my aim is commercial.