03 Mar PAINTING STORY: Gnarly Octopus and the Dirty Heads Summer Tour
“Three-fifths of an octopus’ neurons are not in their brain, but in their arms; each arm has a mind of its own.” Sy Montgomery
GNARLY OCTOPUS is painted on at 24″ x 36″ Fredrix Canvas, mixed media.
The painting is a play on the band Dirty Heads’ mascot, the octopus. In this painting, the octopus is eating Magical Butter off of a spoon. (Scroll down to see the video of me painting this.)
All of this stuff comes from my imagination, naturally. People think I take drugs, but I don’t. My natural state is wide open.
In real life, I see shapes, expressions and bright colors that most people don’t see. I put these things into my paintings.
Would love to send this octopus to a good home. You can buy it here.
Some of my paintings are created as illustrations for a particular use. It works like this – my illustration client will buy the rights to use the digital artwork and then I’ll keep the actual paintings to sell to my collectors later.
I create my illustrations old-school and paint them on canvas so that they will make for a collectible piece of art.
The actual painting doesn’t have lettering or anything on it that will take away from it as art – it’s designed so that it will make for art that will be hung.
It’s a great program, because I have been able to turn most of my illustrations into art that is collected by people around the world. Over time, many have become a little slice of history.
Usually, I’ll only take on art commissions that I know I’ll enjoy. If something comes along that I won’t like, I turn it down. You only do your best work if you’re having fun.
Today’s painting, the Gnarly Octopus, was one of three paintings that I created for Magical Butter. They wanted artwork for a 2016 summer concert tour for Sublime with Rome and the Dirty Heads.
I loved working with Magical Butter, because they are a company of fun people who are creative and open to new ideas. And, listening to the bands’ music kept me going through the process. It was a lot of fun.
If you want to talk to me or Maria before deciding to add Gnarly Octopus to your collection, call or text the studio at 949-678-8133.
Ronald
Posted at 14:29h, 08 MarchThis Gnarly Octopus is my favorite painting of yours. I have never seen it before. The visual texture is very complicated and beautiful. Its also interesting because the image challenges the viewer with its grotesqueness but at the same time its quite playful.