artist studio
January 19 - February 22, 2004

open studio receptions
Friday, February 13, 6 - 9 pm
Wednesday, February 18, Noon - 6:30 pm

About My Paintings

42nd Street has always represented a place of transition.
During the last ten years, 42nd Street has undergone tremendous transformation.

Just like back in the 1890's, when 42nd Street was a playground for the rich, full of Lobster palaces like Murray's Roman Gardens and Rector's, to a more Coney Island-esque atmosphere in the 1930's, which invited everyone, loaded with everything from Gypsy Tea Rooms to Chop Suey, and Hubert's Flea Circus, and when X rated films took over in the 1970's. Today, 42nd street is yet again changing.

My interest in 42nd Street began one Saturday morning in the winter of 1994, when I was on a bus trip from Tyler School of Art to the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
As the bus drove through 42nd Street, I noticed a crumbling old window of a theater. It was then that I became curious and interested in the theaters of 42nd Street. Ever since that day, I have been making paintings that use 42nd Street theater interiors and exteriors, as well as other establishments in Times Square.

However, these days, I am very angry and sad because more and more of 42nd Street and Times Square's beautiful theaters and buildings are being demolished.

The theaters of 42nd Street are very special to me. I was inside almost all of them. I saw them with my own eyes. The beautiful interiors, still intact for so many years, destroyed right before my eyes. I went to 42nd Street every day and saw the interiors, exteriors, boxes, and balconies smashed to bits, along with the mountains of mangles red seats.

I have documented this both in my paintings and on video.
Since 1994, my paintings have evolved from images of theater interiors with silent films on the screen, to film characters moving freely in the spaces, such as hotels and theaters. I have used characters from silent films such as Lillian Gish, as well as stars like James Cagney and Humphrey Bogart.

These days, the characters portray a true feeling of an unsettling loneliness, an uneasy setting, that does not get resolved any time soon. I try to capture the feeling of immense loneliness of the city. I feel that I am preserving what I saw in my work.

Prior to working on a painting, I do countless hours of research on the theater, the film, and other historical information.

Every time I begin, I feel that there is something new. Something that I have yet to discover.