A Journey's Beginning
People say a love of travel indicates a dislike of your hometown-- but this is untrue. All journeys have a beginning. My life’s journey’s start was in Cambridge, Maryland, and it continues to be a huge piece of my heart. It seemed only right to hold my first gallery, the summation of all of my experiences and travels, in the place where everything began.
In no uncertain terms, each of these series I invite you to peruse are a piece of my soul. Although I am eager to hear what you think of each painting, I would like to take a moment to walk you through how these pieces came to be, through my eyes.
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There are three series I offer for your viewing today: The National Park Series, The Maryland Series, and A Series of Private Collections.
The National Park Series
The National Park Series
In total over sixty works, The National Park Series is a cumulative collection of paintings crafted between 2022 and 2023, when I lived in a camper and traveled across the country in an attempt to paint all sixty-three National Parks, fully on site. In that year, I was able to paint in 37 parks, with multiple pieces per park.
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For my spontaneity and love for adventure, I thank my Nana. My National Park journey may have stayed only an idea if she had not purchased a camper first, and announced she would be traveling cross country. Any grandchildren were welcome to come, and of course, I did. Over the next several summers, we traveled up to Maine, out to Wyoming and Montana, and down to Lousiana.
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All those camping trips I had taken as a kid with my family, then those times with Nana in our camper-- sometimes exhilarating, sometimes quiet and reflective, all times impactful – it all prepared me to set out on my own, to have my own adventure. I had gotten a taste for something I was unwilling to give up.
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I purchased a tow behind camper and a truck in February of 2022, and for the next seven months, this would be Saif and I’s home. We traipsed across the country to Maine, then Florida, to California, then Washington. We dashed to Wyoming, and across through Illinois and Ohio, before finally returning to Maryland. After a few more small trips in 2023, I had officially painted 37 National Parks, the product of which you are exploring today.
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The most essential part of this collection is what makes it come to life-- each piece was painted on site. Though it would have been more convenient, certainly faster, to take photos within the park, then take them home to replicate on canvas, the stillness of a photograph was never what I intended to capture. Instead, these paintings represent the hours I spent immersed in the location-- I may start a painting in the sun and finish as it sets, bright yellows shifting to burnt oranges into soft pinks-- I may paint the rocks on the shore of the Atlantic and two hours in, incorporate a family of seagulls that decided to sunbathe on my work’s focus. Each second that could be captured in a photograph, thousands over the hours I spent brush in hand, condensed down into a single painting.
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I hope the time you spend gazing at these scenes brings to you the same peace that the hours I spent in incredible, hypnotic nature brought to me.
The Maryland Series
The Maryland Series
As I said before, a love of travel does not mean you don’t love your hometown. I love seeing my friends and my family. I love not having to look at a map, not having to worry about missing an exit, or a huge cumbersome trailer being pulled behind me. I know these roads like the back of my hand, and in turn, they know me.
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My Maryland series explores the difference time can make to what a path means to you. When I was a child, the road behind the DoCo airport was where I loved to watch the planes land or take off-- people leaving on mysterious, jet-setting journeys, and always seeming to come back.
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That same road became the place I learned to drive, when thirty miles an hour felt like hurtling down a racing track, and my hands were glued at ten and two. When the car became easy, I added a camper, and that road is where I went to get used to dragging the clumsy thing behind me.
Just recently, that road became where I biked with my dad as we trained for the Eagle Man triathalon. If you had asked me when I was on that road watching planes, or learning to drive, if I ever thought I would be training for a triathalon, I would have said a whole-hearted “NO.” and yet, there I was.
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Because, that’s the thing about roads, and that’s the thing about homes-- very rarely do they themselves change. But a million versions of me have driven down them, run down them, biked down them, lingered on them and watched planes touch down from them. A million moments, a million me’s, and the road may not feel the difference, but I sure do.
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But that’s about me, and art is as much about the viewer as it is the artist. How do you see these pieces, beyond what they represent to me? What road do these paintings remind you of, and who were you the last time you were on it?
A Series of Private Collections
A Series of Private Collections
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No matter how many times it happens, there’s something so touching about someone reaching out to ask me for a painting. There’s always that feeling of camaraderie and gratitude when someone sees the value in something I’ve painted. There’s always a feeling of honor when someone trusts me with capturing something custom for them. It’s a window into understanding what’s important to them, like they are letting me in on a secret.
If these paintings are pieces of my soul, then I am grateful for those who have chosen to keep each fragment. Because again, the art is as much about the artist as it is about the viewer. And although these pieces, when they were being created, did not have a thematic link, they certainly do now. They are linked through human connection, and each piece has been altered by each interaction I have had with their collectors. A canvas, sure, but beyond that, something we both touched and cultivated to create something beyond mere paint.
In Closing
There is not a right or wrong way to look at art-- it is transformed just as much as it transforms. Tell me what my paintings make you think of, forget for a moment the name of the road I intended to paint, or the park, or the scene. Their subjects shift the same as your eyes shifting from a distant plane to your rearview mirror, from the moment before you leave home, to after.