FREE SHIPPING
Shipping takes 3–4 Weeks
This ships from Round Lake Beach, Illinois. A suburb outside of Chicago.
I use UPS and sometimes US Post.
This painting, Young Man with a Fade, was a real breakthrough for me. I painted it while living in Palo Alto, California, and at 36 x 48 inches, it’s one of the larger canvases I’ve worked on. It marked a shift in how I approached both surface and composition—something clicked during the process, and I think it shows in the final result.
The painting started with a small oil study, which sold right away, but I was lucky to keep it around long enough to really look at it and learn from it. That study helped me figure out how I wanted to handle the textures and light on the larger version. I started with an alla prima underpainting that I worked on for a full 8-hour day. After it dried, I returned with thinned oil paint to seal the surface and start building layers, obscuring most of the canvas weave while creating depth and subtle sheen.
The real breakthrough came when I started using plastering knives—mixing large batches of color and literally troweling paint onto the canvas. It gave the surface a richness I hadn’t been able to achieve before. There are areas of thick, sculptural paint that I then modulated and refined over a few more sessions. I let texture do as much storytelling as color and form here.
Compositionally, I made a deliberate choice to crop in tight. Instead of centering a full head or body, I zoomed in on what felt most visually and emotionally compelling—the fade, the curve of the ear, the side of the nose, the eye line. That framing creates intimacy without being traditional or generic. It pulls your eye along edges and contours and lets you focus on the sculptural beauty of hair, skin, and bone.
Even though it’s titled Young Man with a Fade, I think of this subject as more fluid. There’s something in the softness of the face and the neutral expression that allows for a broader interpretation. This could be a nonbinary or poly person. I wanted to hold space for that ambiguity.
This painting reflects a lot of what I’ve tried to develop over time—attention to texture, control of light, and a pared-down but intense composition. It’s one of the pieces I still look to when I think about how to move forward in my work.
Details:
Title: Young Man with a Fade
Medium: Oil on stretched canvas
Size: 36 x 48 inches
Year: 2020
Unframed, gallery-wrapped edges
Built up with palette knives and brushes
Sealed surface with visible texture and no canvas weave
Excellent condition, stored in studio
FREE SHIPPING
Shipping takes 3–4 Weeks
This ships from Round Lake Beach, Illinois. A suburb outside of Chicago.
I use UPS and sometimes US Post.
This painting, Young Man with a Fade, was a real breakthrough for me. I painted it while living in Palo Alto, California, and at 36 x 48 inches, it’s one of the larger canvases I’ve worked on. It marked a shift in how I approached both surface and composition—something clicked during the process, and I think it shows in the final result.
The painting started with a small oil study, which sold right away, but I was lucky to keep it around long enough to really look at it and learn from it. That study helped me figure out how I wanted to handle the textures and light on the larger version. I started with an alla prima underpainting that I worked on for a full 8-hour day. After it dried, I returned with thinned oil paint to seal the surface and start building layers, obscuring most of the canvas weave while creating depth and subtle sheen.
The real breakthrough came when I started using plastering knives—mixing large batches of color and literally troweling paint onto the canvas. It gave the surface a richness I hadn’t been able to achieve before. There are areas of thick, sculptural paint that I then modulated and refined over a few more sessions. I let texture do as much storytelling as color and form here.
Compositionally, I made a deliberate choice to crop in tight. Instead of centering a full head or body, I zoomed in on what felt most visually and emotionally compelling—the fade, the curve of the ear, the side of the nose, the eye line. That framing creates intimacy without being traditional or generic. It pulls your eye along edges and contours and lets you focus on the sculptural beauty of hair, skin, and bone.
Even though it’s titled Young Man with a Fade, I think of this subject as more fluid. There’s something in the softness of the face and the neutral expression that allows for a broader interpretation. This could be a nonbinary or poly person. I wanted to hold space for that ambiguity.
This painting reflects a lot of what I’ve tried to develop over time—attention to texture, control of light, and a pared-down but intense composition. It’s one of the pieces I still look to when I think about how to move forward in my work.
Details:
Title: Young Man with a Fade
Medium: Oil on stretched canvas
Size: 36 x 48 inches
Year: 2020
Unframed, gallery-wrapped edges
Built up with palette knives and brushes
Sealed surface with visible texture and no canvas weave
Excellent condition, stored in studio
