trial and error, what i'm after, and the memory of jim steven

the large painting i started yesterday is destroyed. it developed in a way contrary to my objective, still vague to me, and it is precisely because my objective is vague to me that the painting developed the way it did. actually, it's not so much that it developed in an undesirable way as it got off on the wrong foot. in any case, i couldn't succeed with the painting because i didn't know what i was after. in earlier posts i've tried to state my goals, but the effect i want my work to have on viewers remains undeclared. this makes it unnecessarily difficult to achieve successful paintings. it's also something my mentor, the late jim steven, tried to hammer into me when i was an undergraduate at the university of south carolina. there is a deep-seated personal issue at play here, which is why it has proven to be so difficult for me throughout my career to be clear about my objectives. the issue is my fear of failure. i'm trying to defeat my fear of failure by doing work without over-thinking, which is usually where my fear takes hold. this approach has had some success. but i still need to be clear about my objectives. i'll try here: the work is intended to provoke contemplation about controlling the natural world. the central form in these paintings suggests exotic specimens presented as a kind of spectacle on account of their strangeness. underlying the spectacle is a veiled fear of the unknown that imbues the work with a menacing quality. ultimately, it is not nature that is on exhibit, but our fascination with the way things look. in some cases, the central form looks vaguely morbid, but not blatantly so. what if it were morbid and we just don't know it? what would this say about our intrigue? it is not my intention to judge this striving to control what we do not understand, only to point out that it is there and to provoke further contemplation.

above i mentioned jim steven. i found out about 2 months ago when i tried to contact him through USC art that he had passed away. he had been battling lung cancer for years. i had suspected this had happened, but the news was still deeply upsetting. he was my first mentor.