November 2025 Update #1: Painting, fragments, and the small things that connect our world together

I’ve been working on a few larger pieces this week. I showed a few of them last week but they’ve evolved dramatically since. They’re all around thirty-six inches square. Each one’s moving along at its own pace. I like having multiple paintings going at once. It lets me step back, switch gears, and see things I might’ve missed otherwise. I say that I like to let my paintings rest, and sometimes they end up “resting” for weeks and months.

The newest piece that I started is something a little different, though: a collage portrait of a woman by the sea. It’s built from painted papers, torn bits of magazines, and scraps of text layered until the surface starts to feel alive. I’ll even add more paint on top of it all to create additional layers and textures.

But my struggle is that I want my work to have a focus. It’s generally been about the ocean, and this is all on me. I’m drawn to the feeling of it, and I’m attempting to communicate that feeling to others. This is the current mission. It’s not about being too literal. I’ve said before that I paint the wind. That still feels right. So, I’m trying to bridge the gap here, and I’m excited to see where this painting goes. It’s about the line where the world you can see and things you feel start to blend. That’s the idea anyway.

Below is an example of an experiment that I tried previously. It’s an abstract composition of a symphony conductor. It was a great experiment, and I love how it turned out. But for me, it was just an experiment and not something that I wanted to include in my body of work.

So… I gave it to our local arts organization here in Canton as a housewarming gift for their new offices. I was happy to see that they liked it and hung it up to brighten their offices as soon as they received it.

Finding a home for all my art experiments has become a goal of mine. I’ve made so many pieces over the years that ended up tucked away in the dark. Sometimes the best feeling isn’t when a painting sells or hangs in a gallery. It’s when it finds its way to someone who connects with it, enjoys it, or gets some value from it.

Giving a piece to a friend or donating it to a good cause often feels even better than a sale. I’m lucky, I don’t have to make money from my art. If it can make someone happy or help raise money for something worthwhile, that’s a great thing.

Below are some of the images they posted online about receiving the gift. I love it.

Last weekend, I pulled out some older paintings I hadn’t looked at in years. I found two small Christmas-themed pieces that I actually liked more than I remembered. I started building frames for them and set a goal to hang them in our home this season. The frames are still in progress, though.

These small paintings reminded me how good it is to revisit old work once in a while. You see where you’ve grown, but also where you’ve stayed the same. Some things just keep following you through time. But there are other approaches that you forgot that might be useful to bring back and build upon.

I think these paintings are interesting because they do successfully combine the real world and the abstract without being too literal. I love that.

That tension keeps me painting and exploring, and improving.

Now, to switch gears slightly.

I’ve been reading about microplastics this week. I’m always trying to learn and maybe help you to learn as well.

Microplastics are tiny fragments, smaller than a grain of rice, created when larger plastics break down in the ocean. Bottles, packaging, clothing fibers, car tires. The ocean doesn’t destroy them; it just grinds them into smaller pieces.

They’re now everywhere: in fish, in the air, in snow in the Arctic. Scientists have even found them in human blood.

The scale is mind-blowing, but what struck me most was how invisible it all is. These particles are too small to notice, yet they’re reshaping the planet.

That made me think about the small things we do that shape the world. I live in Ohio, and I can directly affect even the smallest living creatures around the world with my actions. It’s real.

Every time we reuse something, skip a disposable bag, or pick up and recycle a bottle we didn’t drop, we’re repairing instead of damaging.

And that thought brought me right back to my art.

In the studio, I’m surrounded by scraps. Torn edges, bits of color, little pieces that once belonged to something else. Collage is about recombining those random scraps into something new. The difference between art and waste is just intention.

Both are made of fragments.

The creative process is similar to the ocean itself. Constant motion, endless transformation. Nothing ever disappears. It just changes form.

That’s probably why I keep painting the sea. It’s both infinite and familiar.

As creative people, we send pieces of ourselves out into the world and hope they land somewhere meaningful.

I currently don’t paint full-time. My days are full of other responsibilities. But each week, I make progress. A few hours here, an evening there. It adds up. The momentum stays alive.

I think that’s what creative, intentional living really is. It’s not about full-time focus or perfect schedules or progress. It’s about continuing the work, even in the small spaces between everything else.

The same idea applies beyond the studio. Whether it’s the art we make, the choices we make, or the way we treat the world around us, progress doesn’t have to happen all at once.

Small steps matter. Tiny habits, quiet care, daily awareness. They build into something lasting if we keep at it. I believe in this deeply. I have to, otherwise I would get discouraged, and have.

Every time we reuse, repurpose, or simply pay attention, we’re contributing to something bigger than ourselves. The ocean, like creativity, responds to what we give it.

It doesn’t take much each day, just consistency, curiosity, and care.

Over time, those small actions, those small hours of work, become something meaningful.

That’s what’s on my mind this week.

We don’t need to change everything overnight. We just need to keep showing up.