Medium: Hallucinogenic landscape paintings
Ancillary interests: Co-founder of Deluxe Projects, a contemporary art project space in Pilsen; lead guitarist for the band The Peelers; instructor at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and Robert Morris College.
Latest development: Exhibition at Vedanta Gallery, 835 W. Washington St., through July 20.
How people have described your paintings: Gooey, lickable, cinematic, paranoid.
Favorite artists: Paul McCarthy, Jackson Pollock, Bruce Nauman, Ed Ruscha.
Inspiration: Rock ‘n’ roll music. It just turns me on generally.
Satisfaction: Researching the images for my paintings over the Internet and in books, magazines, television, film and newspapers. A lot of my work deals with topical issues — like the Oklahoma City bombing, militia encampments, motels that terrorists would stay in — that have to do with the banality of evil. So when I’m researching an image I like to look at its history, how it’s been used, who’s used it. Then making it isn’t bad either.
Moment you realized making art was a viable profession: When my parents took me to an Ed Kienholz exhibition at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art when I was 8 or 9. There were two pieces that really struck me — “Back Seat Dodge ’38” and “Sawdy.” His pieces are very, very intense. I remember looking at them and taking in this kind of presence they had. I remember thinking someone actually made this and this is something you can do.
Best decision: Drawing a 6-by-6-foot portrait of Jimi Hendrix in graphite on my dorm room wall at Long Beach State. Up until then I thought I would be a graphic designer, and this was the first thing I did just for the hell of it. I found the solitude and focusing on something intensely for two weeks to be such a pleasure, and then having people react to it was a pleasure, too. Everyone freaked out, especially the R.A. I became infamous in the dorm community. It was a big, trippy drawing that only a 21-year-old guy would do.
Reason for running your own project space: We don’t have to fawn over the power brokers. We get to show good ideas in a concentrated space, but not what people call “new and emerging art.” I don’t know what that is. Everyone is making new art and everyone is constantly emerging as an artist.
Prized possession: My 1979 Sienna Sunburst Fender Stratocaster.
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Favorite spot in Chicago: Sitting in front of a bowl of mussels in white wine sauce at Le Bouchon.
Act of rebellion: Leading a multifaceted life. When you get trained as an artist there’s this idea that you can be only an artist and everything else has to fall away. That’s a romantic idea handed to us from art history, like the story of Pollock. It’s just not like that. I’m able to be an artist, a musician, a teacher and husband. They all kind of nourish each other but they’re also separate and distinct.