Transcript

1. Art/Official

   Three orientation questions before the blind description: 1) Temporal distance — how far back does this one feel? 2) Series relationship — where does this sit within the OG Oil Paintings for you? 3) Physical location — do you know where this painting is right now?

2. Artist

   Pretty distant, was a long time ago and part of when I first started painting. Was part of the original oil painting series and part of the fisheye period. I don't know where it is anymore or who has it, last seen in 94 or so, so maybe gave it to somebody.

3. Art/Official

   Blind first description request.

4. Artist

   This is a painting of the view on a train when I took the Amtrak to LA from SF.

5. Art/Official

   Anything else that comes to mind — any particular part of the view, what the trip was about, how it felt to paint it?

6. Artist

   Was one of the first trips I took outside of San Francisco on my own, and used a super fisheye perspective to paint it.

7. Art/Official

   Vision analysis presented: fisheye-warped train car interior, rounded lens-like window shape, warm interior vs cool exterior landscape, centered aisle vantage. Questions: was the window shape a conscious choice or emergent from the fisheye rendering; does the interior/exterior contrast read as confinement vs freedom or was it purely observational.

8. Artist

   I think the painting wasn't painted on the train, so this was a painting I made from the sketch that I made on the train. Yeah, the fisheye was something I was working with in other painting and I guess I just noticed this angle on the train, looking forward and backwards. I think the outside and inside are more imagined than true to the scene.

9. Art/Official

   Follow-up: what got changed/embellished from the actual scene — landscape, window shape, interior, or all of it? Was the aisle vantage deliberately chosen for the fisheye symmetry, or just what was in front of you?

10. Artist

    I don't remember what it looked like, but I think I was more focused on the shape of the window, so just wanted to paint the other part to fit. And I think I just was on a long train ride and realized this fisheye scene.

11. Art/Official

    Question: did you have an actual fisheye lens/photos as reference, or working purely from skate video memory? Was the solo trip connected to why you started painting from it, or coincidental?

12. Artist

    No camera, just the skate video references. I don't think the trip was specific to the painting and would have found itself somewhere else.

13. Art/Official

    Self-assessment questions: honest assessment now, thirty-plus years out — accomplished, experiment, student work? Any sense of where the painting went?

14. Artist

    Not sure, I think the idea still holds up, don't have the paintings so don't know if the technique was good, maybe not so much, but definitely thought of it as a successful painting at the time. I think it still holds up, but would still think of it as an early experimental one.

15. Art/Official

    Pressed further on provenance guess, and asked: does this connect to other catalogued early oils (Space Time, Nature vs Nurture, The End) through fisheye logic or subject/mood? Anything else before formal close?

16. Artist

    I think I probably gave it to somebody. Yeah, I think it connects in the fisheye thing, but didn't have the idea behind it that the other ones, so more representational.