Primary work: Self Portrait 1993
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- Artist
this is one of my oldest paintings, its a self portrait from 1993 done with oil on canvas. the painting is 22" x 22"
- Art/Official
Good to know — one of the originals.
- Art/Official
Is this part of something ongoing, or does it feel more like a standalone moment?
- Artist
its part of my origial OG paintings that I did in oil paint. after high school I started to read a lot of liturature and about art and decided I wanted to start painting, so I got cnavas and oil paint and started these paintings. did really know what I was doing, so most paintings were on raw canvas that I would strech and just paint with oils. didn't know what I was doing, but it worked itself out and was the spark of it all
- Art/Official
That's a real origin story — the whole practice starting from raw canvas and figuring it out as you went.
- Art/Official
Where were you when you made this one?
- Artist
back at my parents house in the sunset district in San Francisco
- Art/Official
San Francisco, living at home, teaching yourself to paint. Before you upload — describe this work to me first, before either of us sees it. I'll ask you again later, once we've talked it through, and we'll look at both together at the end. There's no right way to do this — however it comes is exactly right.
- Artist
the work is an attempt at a self portrait on my birthday in 1993. it shows just my head painted in a surreal way and was wearing a baseball hat. the head is in a grey room with a window to the outside, I think there is a finger on the window ledge, outside is green sky with tree branches
- Art/Official
Got it — go ahead and upload when you're ready.
- Artist
I have uploaded the primary artwork image.
- Art/Official
That's striking — much more than just a self-portrait. The head is enormous relative to the space, the hat bleeds right off the canvas, and that disembodied hand is doing something quietly unsettling. The single blue eye looking sideways, the red lips, the shadow — there's a lot of Dalí in the room here. Let me check the legacy records and get the image analysis running.
- Art/Official
No exact match in the legacy records — the only OG oil painting there is "Nietzche's Dream" from 1997, which doesn't sound like this one. What's the title of this painting?
- Artist
Self Portrait 1993
- Art/Official
Simple and direct — right for what it is.
- Art/Official
All the basics are staged. 22 × 22 inches — a square canvas on your first self-portrait attempt, which is an interesting choice. You mentioned you'd been reading a lot of literature and art books before starting these paintings. What were you reading at the time that fed into this one specifically?
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- Artist
mostly european liturature and philosophy, neitsche and goerthe and sartre, plus some henry miller. I think I went through school just trying to get by and pass, which I did, but wasn't to engaged. and then after leaving school I was on my own and started to really teach myself, albiet alot of older european stuff, but was interesting for me. and I think starting to paint was just a way to be a part of it all somehow
- Art/Official
That's a real shift — from getting through school to actually wanting to learn, and painting as a way of joining a conversation you'd found on your own terms.
- Art/Official
The surreal quality in the painting — the oversized head, the green sky, that strange disembodied hand — did that come from what you were reading, or were you also looking at specific painters at the time?
- Artist
I was looking at a lot of Dali, but also tangray and magritte and paul klee
- Art/Official
Great references — and they're all visible in the work. The Magritte logic of the interior/exterior divide, the Tanguy dreamscape colour outside the window, Klee's flattened figure-making.
- Art/Official
You said this was painted on your birthday — was that deliberate, painting yourself on that specific day, or did it just happen to be when you sat down to do it?
- Artist
was deliberate, I did it for three birthdays straight, and then maybe once or twice since then
- Art/Official
That's a real ritual — using the self-portrait as an annual marker. Almost like a timestamp on who you were at that moment.