With  “Little Blue Motorcycle,” I’m  poking fun at photoreal painting by supporting the small canvas with a shiny, 3D structure. That thin zone between two and three dimensions fascinates me: the vague boundary between Illusion and reality. The “Bicycle Painting” was my ultimate expression of this. A 3D chain passes through a 2D illusion — is it a decorated bicycle or a rideable painting? It’s been in museums, but I’ve also ridden it on the track.

I love mechanical technology for the implied movement but also for the way the reflected light feels like movement. As a kid, I was fascinated with all mechanical objects in our house, from pencil sharpeners, to the car, to the piano. Even objects like spoons and bottles amazed me. Going to the famed Oshkosh Air Show with Juli, in the early 1980s, transfixed me. For years, I raced an Austin Healey 100-4 more because of the way it looked than the way it drove.

These canvases may look like paintings, but really they’re more like drawings. I start with a number of light “painted” color-washes, followed by countless hours of dry brush “drawing” on top. A magnified sideview cutaway of the canvas surface would reveal a long range of tiny, similar-sized mountains: the weave of the canvas. The color-washes quickly fill the valley floors, but then I spend a great deal more time dry brushing the peaks and middle slopes with paint.  This seems to create a glowing quality that looks non-representational up close but at any distance creates a sudden illusion. I like that moment when the illusion takes place. Also, I use mostly primary colors plus black and white, almost like I’m a very slow, inkjet printer. I’m not recommending this approach; it's just what came naturally to me, and I liked the result.