"The New Warholics and Visual Karaoke"

I will take this opportunity to humbly thank those artists (both living and passed) who have influenced my six decades of work.

That's right, I've been painting since my earliest recollections of finger painting in Kindergarten at Essex Street Public School near Christie Pits in Toronto. In all the time that I have been working, I scarcely recall a time where creativity has been devouring and regurgitating itself more than today. Please don't misunderstand me- art has always built upon the past.

What's different today is that many painters stop at what they think they've learned, and are content to offer a type of VISUAL KARAOKE as their own, without , in fact, "owning it". It is as if they are aware of a type of visual amnesia which has permeated the minds of the last couple of generations. When is a Warhol not a Warhol? When is a Pollock anything but throwing and splashing paint-he invented it, right? Or did he? Technique does not a style make! Or does it?

Let's make one thing clear: ART is about Freedom, Expression and a human need for outpouring. I get it. That is why I am simply observing and not judging. It's very exciting, this time of ultimate choice of media, throwing it all out there and offering it to the unsuspecting public as profound A..R...T....!!! Wow. Thank God for Damien, the Bitcoin of Art. He helped monetize all of this but wasn't alone in doing so. We now have temples to mediocrity sprayed upon unsuspecting walls with "mysteries" and stories" as components of "the piece", and to distract us from what might be rightfully perceived as a rudimentary stencil meant for the shredder at auction. Ah, but so meaningful and profound- but to whom? To the moneylenders and the philistines, perhaps?

"Grey is my favourite colour, I felt so symbolic yesterday. Mr. Jones and me. We stare at the beautiful women..........

IF I KNEW PICASSO.