i believe in nothing[s]

In preparation for a job interview tomorrow, I have been assembling a sort of mini-portfolio. I haven't looked at the work i did in Rome for probably two years and I was struck by how much better it is than the paintings I am currently making. The old paintings are basically about nothing, almost purely visual [at least in their conception]. The current paintings are trying to be about something, and I can't get myself interested enough. They seem almost shy, maybe even a little bit bored with themselves. I have never really wanted to "say something" with anything I make. Maybe by trying to force a statement I have watered down whatever the paint itself was saying before.

The current body of work has focused on memory- differences between the memory of something and the thing itself specifically. I try to choose recognizable images, remove them from the context of my memory of them, and bring them into an iconic state. Ideally, this points out the flaws in the ideas of image-making as story-telling and communication. I have to be honest and say that this has not worked out terribly well. I am unsure of how to make a painting about the idea that something is actually nothing, but have the product of that thought be a something.

In any case, the visual is my strength and I should not be forsaking it for a deeper meaning. At least, not one that I have to impose artificially. I have hung several of my better pieces from the past on my bedroom walls (there is nowhere to hang them in my work space) and I am hoping that by exposure to them I will be able to steer my thinking back into a better place. I do not think that all this has been a waste, these last few years of painting. I have been stripping down and stripping down, and now the time has come, i believe, to build up again. To thicken the application of paint and be comfortable making real nothings again.