Inspirations and dedication 8' x 6' triptych for Jamie O

A brief history....

So yeah, I get this call in August from Jamie O'Brien, indisputably one of the best Surfers in the world today....he was inquiring about doing a few more paintings for his house on Pipeline. Jamie has been a collector of my work since 2006-07. A few years after doing the murals at Pipeline Cafe' in Kaka'ako, Troy Alotis had introduced me to Jamie and MickO (Jamie's Dad) so I could start showing my work at what I like to call the "50-yard-line house" directly in front of Pipeline. Deborah, (my dear late wife) being from Australia along with Mick and Jamie's love for art, we all automatically became fast friends amongst the buzz of that yard. (full of competitors, shapers, filmers, industry folk, and well-wishers' during every Pipe contest) Now, that I live on the North Shore, I still go back to sit on Micko's deck most days that Pipe is firing.

The Commission 
The first painting Jamie ordered is the subject of this blog. An eight foot high by six wide triptych depicting the view of a twelve foot bomb at Teahupo'o, Tahiti....a challenge indeed. If you've followed my art you'd know that I've done a catalog of paintings of Pipe inside and out (as I've surfed it, fell in love with her, and made my peace with not being able to surf there anymore.) Now, to truly depict an experience that I have no intention of even dreaming about doing! Well, dreaming is OK. When he gave me the concept, I said "fukya, but I'm gonna need some guidance".

The first challenge was building the canvas....as it is custom fit to the ceiling in his house....

Custom built stretchers 8' on high side, 6' on the low side, 3-24" wide canvases. I've always reveled in the possibilities that a blank canvas holds, especially one you might feel you want to "walk" through or in this case, "ride" through.


And this is the beginning of a dream scape.
Once the canvas was built, Jamie agreed to come up to the studio and help lay down the initial sketch.....so he brings along Kalani Chapman. Another Teahupo'o expert....

Here we are going over some GoPro footage by Pete Hodgson. We also used references by Domenic Mosqueira,  Clark Little, Brent Bielmann, and footage from Jack McCoy's "A Deeper Shade of Blue" 

Mahalo to two of the world's best barrel riders. My two favorites indeed. To be able to have the insights (pun intended) of these two-made the difference toward the success of this work. I believe in transfer of energy, whether it's talking story or just being there to have one suggestion, it all affects the painting process. I think the more input and appreciation that a painting experiences while it's being created gives a piece power. It's amazing how certain people can feel this energy while looking at a completed piece without knowing the history of its inspirations. 

With the initial lines drawn, the next step was to refine, define, and align all the subtleties of this immense wave. 

The first color layer after laying down the initial sketch in Burnt Umber. By using a warm color instead of Black for the sketch, color theory comes into play when painting with translucent paint. Since the finished work will be predominantly Blue, by using its compliment, an orangey brown brings more life into the mix. Once the first color layer was applied, it mapped out where the textures were added.

Here it is in the afternoon sunlight coming into the studio at sunset time. The first layers of light layer glazing beginning to glow-showing promise....

At this point, Jamie and I were discussing how the bottom drops out of huge barreling waves and wanted to capture this movement. We turned the light blue reference lines at the bottom of the wave towards the mountain to create more draw off the reef.

Also, changing the lip line to a more horizontal line to widen the space between the lip and the viewer. We also took away most of the foam ball (the explosion caused by the lip of the wave to the right) to create more openness within the barrel. Once these references were addressed, the composition was set and  I could begin with the heavy glazing process.

"The science of play and dreams are more than half of the work. This is done using the tool of imagination".

....and the use of my room mate tool..... Seriously though, the talented Mr. Patrick Parker steps in for a few defining strokes. We always critique each others art as students do in art class. It keeps our art vocabulary straight forward and honest- bringing out the best in ours and others works. This is the gold of "the Plant Too Pupukea", it's facilitation of the creative and collaborative process thrives here....We are about to celebrate two years at this energetically magical place. So many artists have come here to paint and exchange ideas....So grateful for this place, Mahalo Ke Akua

Here, the mountain's details are laid down. At this point, there are twelve layers of glaze, paint and varnish with the paint layers getting thinner and the glaze layers thicker. This allows light to penetrate while bottom layers remain visible. This is the key to the painting's ability to change colors as lighting varies.

Detail shot of the Tahitian mountain range.

At this stage, translucent iridescent pigments were added throughout...thin layers of Gold, Violet, Magenta, Blue Green, and Silver.

After all the shiny stuff was laid down, yet another layer of translucent blues were added to calm down the reflective iridescent layer.

The painting was then moved to my usual painting space where I use dimmers to see rough areas. By raising and lowering the light levels I am able to connect the dots and smooth out transitions to match the changing light. 18 layers and counting.....

Here's a detail shot of the textures.

The completed piece done, a total of 22 layers of paint, glaze, and varnish. "A good days work never hurt anyone" was the caption of this photo. The sides of the painting were painted with the same color as the wall in Jamie's house to give it a clean floating effect....

Delivery and installation of the pieces into Jamie's house....

The most sturdy way to hang large pieces is to use an "Irish Cleat".

Once the cleats were installed on the painting and wall, it was easy as 1,2,3.

Mission accomplished. Stoke out one of the best barrel riders in the world....my job is pretty friken cool.

Ladles and Jellyspoons, may I present to you "The Jamie O'Brien Contemporary Museum of Modern Surf Art" featured on the far left, Banzai Pipeline, a 4' x 6' painting that he ordered last year after seeing the commission for Banzai Sushi Bar in 2013. 

I've known Jamie and MickO for a relatively short time, being closer to MickO through the years as our ages are closer, but it's this Teahupo'o piece that had grown my friendship with Jamie. Sharing a ton of laughs and insights about surfing and life throughout the span of this project. 

The North Shore is built not only by its waves and the droves of surfers that come here every year. It's built on healthy relationships and a love for this unique community. It's about humility, grace, and, hardships in the water and out. It takes years of these qualities to be a constant presence here....

People always ask, "How long did that painting take?" I always say, "about 37 years....."

Photos by Patrick Parker, Clark Takashima, and Christian Cook.

"vibrational plains"

"There was a time when everything that i have ever imagined & experienced did not seem real at all....until it lead me on a quest toward what i thought was real....The nightmares have become the lessons -of truth and pure vibration. The road just a small part of the journey, the journey, just a small part of the story, the story, just a small part of the love..." sea-T2013

EYE LA VIEW

Inspirations...Respirations.....and Those who Inspire me.

"My Life and heart is an Open book, and never a baited hook. Real eyes that yours too, is just a minuscule speck of time and you'll be fine."

Sea-T2013

Most of my posts here and on FB are an open diary. It's purpose, to hopefully bring our being-ness to a transparent world that no hidden agendas and misunderstandings in this life of change. A certain vulnerability brought to light. As an Artist, the work I co-create or transpose is open for approval in this subjective world of likes and dislikes. While in college, my two main courses of study were Psychology and Art. In the years to follow, a school of life had happened.   Realizing college never ends, this Soul of mine has taken me for an amazing ride.

"Imagine your soul.....how it travels through space and time....then, your body, restricted until refined. Who do you reach for in the early morning light? Is it somewhere across the field of your bed? Or inside, with your life of wonder towards the Divine ?"

Sea-T2013

Breaking the rules was always a part of my early wanderings. Sometimes getting caught, sometimes not. By having this mentality, I've found myself in the most decadent to the most down and dirty places. (Some would say there is no difference.) As William S. Burroughs would attest "I wouldn't recommend it to everyone."  Pushing the envelope was standard. Mine is not a famous life. Yet along the way, i've come to realize this.....here is a designed plan which needs to be followed through. Your individual story. Unique as any movie, unique as any adventure novel. I've touched upon the revelation of how our time here in this lifetime is a speck of a speck of a speck when placed in the annuls of this world and Universe.

"What time is it?"...."wait"...."what?"....What?....Wait!...."Why?"........."its 5:55 muthafaka! The Time Is NOW!" -from conversations between Gallery Director and Artist on a slow day at thomadro gallery in Haleiwa.

Most of you have heard of the now concept and many as i have in the past saw it in one dimensional terms "living in the now". Nothing can be done in the past or future. Our projections of past and future are exactly that-Projections....so lets reel this concept into the reality of now. This moment, second that is already the past as you read each word. We are time travelers in the forward moving now. Its that saying, "only a fool trips on his past"- the future also is relevant in this context.

Energy. All is One. Don't you Fret.

A little understanding of Quantum Physics can blow your mind in the realization of our connections that we taste on an intimate level or a unversal scale. Here is one video that opened a can and released a few worms "Our Fractal Universe, we are all connected"  and lead to most of the symbolisms in the art coming out of these energetic thought patterns. On a conscious level, all that we've learned from the time we are born to now, is a movie. Our individual story. No one can exactly know every experience you have in your story, shit, we forget many of our experiences in our own stories. It is fact no one else may know everything about you- too  busy with their own story.  We have been a distracted race of beings from the get go. Mixed signals of  "all you ever need to know you learned in Kindergarten" to Competitive sports, money making, and Love in dying to eternal life. There it began as "God", "source" wanted somebody to talk to.....Juxtaposition, fuck the inquisition....this separation to be heard can be a mind trip in the planes of "all is one".  So as to be heard is where love and beauty is born. Along with it, the void between source and this love. That void where striving occurs, where giving up is contemplated. The fear, or rather the absence of love. The mind trip of "god starting the universe to say Haaay! then coming to the knowing creator as silence. We delve into enlightenment for peace, practice flow, shedding noise, regain poise, in humility of our source. There lay genius in "no words". In Hawaii, a pidgin english saying sums up many meanings. "no talk stink" goes further than any self help book beyond 100 pages. Quieting the mind. Shitya....Shiva. "no shit sherlock", all give us mirrors to react to or not. Treating others as the metaphorical mirrors they are, smile into them, know you cannot gain relief by scratching the surface of the mirror if your nose itches, and for God's sake don't break it (them)- that would be bad luck!

Inspirations for "You'll never be alone again"

I've always loved to paint big. Although still relatively small to the sizes that i will be doing in the future....

This 36" x 48" canvas is a culmination of style wanderings within the last two years of my 36 year painting life. The shift began with the Radbowvision series at the beach house at Keiki beach. Where i started introducing all the colors of the rainbow with out it being too-Uni-corny. Another shift occured while i was painting on the deck of Buttons Kaluhiokalani's house. Patrick Parker was doing these little canvases where he'd painted the canvas black then brought out mid-tones and highlights. It was there where the studies and work developed and evolved into the "Universal Soul Series".

As mentioned in other notes on inspirations, there is always more than meets the eye.

This winter, we have hosted many fine artists here at the Plant Too Pupukea, worked on many collaborations and have exchanged a plethora of ideas. A few works have these paintings under my paintings. I believe the energy that was put down in these loose collaborations was an added sort of boot camp in brush strokes. Puns abound. Words were painted, hands got dirty in the mix. Fingernails were bloodied by zipper sounding scrapes, layers mixed in paint and blood. Twenty dollar bills inserted between layers in defiance toward our money system. So that 6k commish was now a $5,980.00 piece. A certain oxy-moronic freedom learned in light, vibrations, and color....and ignorance. Sometimes breeding nothing but a drunken.....mess of this muddied flagrant blurry waste of paint that needed to be cleaned off the floor....in semi-hangover mode. But hey, at least i ate as organic as possible while dirnking and smoking like i was in the 50's era. What will the landlord think? Luckily, the only complaint was that the bass to treble ratio needed to be cut.

"To lose one's self"....as in Hemingway, Steinbeck or Eminem.

People have always asked me about the war that comes with a blank canvas. I've never saw that or had the thought process that made me afraid of it...the blank canvas is one of the only places i feel most comfortable, secure, and hold moment to moment decision making. I've posted here on Facebook many things that~friends come up to me later to say that "i don't get what you are talking about". So, i like to kid back and say, "i don't either, so i must be on the right track".  Simply put, we are on this trail of surrender, no pre-edictated outcome to rely, exploration of our self, joy, and reciprocation. With a smile like you mean it strut. Tom Robbins wrote one of his characters to say "everybody has a hard-luck story". That statement has lead to other steady and subtle out comes in the things posted here on Facebook sometimes our only link to the outside world. These series (Radbowvision, Dream, and Universal Soul) coincide with a wandering.... of mind and paint. Some call it going off the deep end....i guess most call it that. Taking the paint and strokes to definitive blurriness and back. So again, yeah....about the painting....

"You will never be alone again...."

i look at these sometimes subtle seekings, blatant struggles, and flow of love going down all around me. I watch as information is passed between lighted phones, computer screens,....and people. Magic without the illusionistic smoke and mirrors, true magic. In a one love drive centimeter mile. Seeing swells hit the shore, listen as the winds barrel down Waimea valley in starship stealthness, rustling every treetop and plant on its wanderings toward the feathering lips exploding through the semi-permeable surfaces. Stars and clouds quiet-amazingly accurate in their relative slowly shifting journey. Energy, all energies. Primal & infinite. The challenging crashing wave like words and actions born of the forgiving calm and fierce temperatures which it was created. Silent vibrations beginning as thought seeds grown into music and vegetables. At the top of the work, a fetus head had appeared, face small, head large at center the Pineal gland. Out of the fetus' closed lips come the swirls of Fibonacci. With this painting, i set out to not delve into overdrive details, but to loosely form with colors, painting the light off its blank dark void. There are many questions that are asked in our quest of life and spiritual....paths. Seekings, Struggles, and Flows intangible. The title came before the painting in its underpainting stage, where i did a two step written painting. I wrote in paint all the frustrations and heartaches involved with Porkchops illness, passing, and going on without her until now. after i blacked out/blocked out the canvas, i wrote again words of realizations and wishes. "You will never be alone again" came from fully feeling the presence of source. The feeling of wholeness that can only be described as Love. The same love exchanged, the same love of self, which is all the same love without physicality. Not only our love of all that is physical...Our souls source....is always with us. so don't hold your breath, just breathe easy....when no one is around to say those dreamy three words, everything around is there to tell you so....

your life as a flower.

You my friend, are an angel too. You are always capable of helping someone else heal.....
We are all bridges. Connecting pathways over stale water, striding on solid ground through mid-air. Metaphoric bridges that carry us to the next scene of the nows we contemplate-as we move within and without. We sometimes measure time in the rushes and worry of being late. When we should be using the measurement of time to see the vastness of eternity. We are but a speck that we note to be a long and hard drawn out conundrum. As we enter this informational one. God. Your Source. Our Source. There is too much. too much to ask. too much to want. too much to eat, drink, too understand....comprehend.
Today, i woke in a very calm state of  surrender. Not of giving up, not of asking questions, not of want. there was only a cool breeze that made the chimes dance in a quiet song. Then i proceeded to pick a single Plumeria outside the front door, held it to my nose in respect, reverence, and rememberance. I went back to my bedroom and placed it next to Porkchop's picture. Two books sit there, a Bukowski and Rumi. i heard "read the Rumi, It's been a while." As of late,you see, i haven't laid much weight to the instantaneous answers that our intuitions give us....and yes, i do admit, at times, i've just said "fuckit it might be fun to just do the opposite!" ha. pity the fool...
So this time, without hesitation, i slid the Rumi out from under the short stack of the Bukowski. Whenever i open this Rumi Book, it seems to open to a page in the middle of a story or poem, rarely in the beginning. Then i go back to beginning. It opened in the middle of The sory of the King and the Handmaiden....I did a search to bring you a link to it-but came across this pdf from Afghansufi.com it breaks the story down into a less proverbially guessing kinda way. the book i read from this morning is The Essential Rumi, translated by Coleman Barks. So see what you can find on your search for the same translation.

So yeah, this post is just slice of insights on flow that i hope will help one person out here cross that metaphoric bridge by seeing we are all able to help others over it. Taking the first step involving
discipline to do so....

"When you feel gloomed over,
it's your failure to praise. Irreverence
and no discipline rob your soul of light."
-Rumi

On flow. I've both resisted and relented, then ultimately surrendered in my life so far. As of late have not exposed myself to outer influences that instill fear. Although some (well maybe a lot throughout my life) substance abuse had played a role in my fear factors and facilities. there is a certain "stoner's Luck" (God's will) that allows us to be....Happy, without, within...our will cut to our conscious decision.

Your life is a flower that buds, blooms, and withers. In realtime. know this as your time here is shorter than you might expect and contemplate. all your job is to hold rememberance, reverence, respect in constant gratitude as the continual prayer of your conscious being. In a desciplinary display of an athlete.  nothing else is more sacred to the One.....thoughts?

New Bio

Love to Paint!, and write, and sculpt. Take things to the extreme. 50 years young in 2013. As of late, i have been seeking ancient knowlege. It began when my father taught me how to draw at 5 years of age.  I took up painting at the time i learned to surf, i was 13.  Love has guided me to love. I have studied Art as a major and psychology as a minor.  I've sought museums and stared at masterpieces in my travels across the globe. I surround myself with great artists in the surf art genre. I live at The Plant Too, Pupukea, on the north shore of Oahu. My seeking is a curious continuum. I study how the Masters lay out their compositions and i find more to seek. Fibonacci sequence, Golden mean, Sacred Geometry are all that is involved. I am grateful for the experiences that are given in this paradise. I am one of a few artists that are born here in Hawaii. Eye La View, I love to Paint. Thank You. I am with you. I am You.