Kai Samuels-Davis

0:00SPEAKER_02:All my old work is it's a diary. I could show that if I went to a therapist, I would just say, This, this is this is my emotional history.

0:08SPEAKER_01:Oh wow.

0:09SPEAKER_02:Um because there was there was times when I was feeling lost and disconnected, yeah, and all my paintings were in this gray void and kind of desaturated. Then I was feeling a little more kind of all over the place and and kind of frazzled and what should I do and not very grounded. Uh and then my paintings got all fragmented and and kind of and broken up. And so between the way I paint and the colors I use and and what I'm painting, there's all these these ways to these tools of expression that subconsciously they're very much expressing exactly what's going on in my mind.

0:54SPEAKER_03:Welcome to Creative Contemplation Podcast. I'm your host and the creator, Suzanne Lago Arthur. I'm a realist painter working in oils from Loudoun County, Virginia, and I'm fascinated with the subject of creativity. I want to know what was the spark that led creative professionals into the fields they are in, why they make the work that they do, and what can we learn from each other? Listen along as we answer these questions and more. I'll be interviewing people from all over the creative universe, artists, designers, writers, you name it, even museum experts who will give us insight into other famous creative minds.

1:27SPEAKER_03:Maybe together we can find the answers. Thanks for joining us today. My guest today is the painter Kai Samuel Davis. Welcome to the podcast, Kai.

1:44SPEAKER_02:Thanks, Suzanne.

1:46SPEAKER_03:I'm excited to have you on. Congratulations on your show. Thank you very much. It was such a uh I'm I'm just still still decompressing the show. You just had the opening, right? When was that?

1:56SPEAKER_02:Yeah, the opening was Saturday. And then we were my family and I were down in the city Tuesday. And so yesterday, Monday, I tried to decompress a little bit, but it was, you know, uh it was two weeks of doing nothing but working on the show.

2:07SPEAKER_07:Yeah.

2:08SPEAKER_02:Before that was months of only working on the show. And it was just such a seemingly it seemed like all like right now, all I can remember is working on the show.

2:17SPEAKER_03:It seemed all encompassing when you were working on at least what you were what you were posting, you know. Uh we'll get into that a little bit more. I'd I'd actually like to start with kind of the beginning for you as a as an artist, your early formation. You know, where did you study? Because I'd like I love for the listeners to kind of understand who you became.

2:36SPEAKER_02:Sure, sure. I'll start early, early just for just because it's kind of funny, and then and I'll give you the whole the rundown. Yeah. Um when I I grew up in upstate New York in Catskill, very sheltered. There's no there was no now, there's an arts uh versioning arts community. Um not when I was a kid. Very just kind of rundown and sheltered. You couldn't buy a CD in our town.

2:58SPEAKER_06:Wow.

2:59SPEAKER_02:It was uh not much doing except Burger King. And kids would just hang out at the Bird King parking lot kind of thing. And um, and so I remember when I was five. I remember driving. We were in the car, and my parents asked me what I wanted to do when I grew up. And I said I wanted to be an artist. And they said, Oh, well, you can't you can you can do that, but you can't make money. Uh you can't do that for work.

3:21SPEAKER_07:Right.

3:21SPEAKER_02:And I mean I was five. So I wish I had a clear memory of my response. I want to say that I was like, well, do anyway, because that's what it naturally evolved into. I didn't never cared about. I mean, that it was a recurring comment on being an artist.

3:34SPEAKER_03:Right, right, right. One that everybody's heard.

3:36SPEAKER_02:Yeah. Right. Um, and I'm I'm sure I just kind of like was like, oh, a lot of love then. And uh, but first grade, I remember selling my first drawing to the other kids in the class. Because I would draw these little uh it's kind of a combination of a pelican or uh a like a toucan and a penguin kind of bird, just these like weird, just strange penguin-ish birds with different different kind of patterns and and stuff on them. And uh I would just draw them for fun in class, and someone saw one and said, Oh, I want one of those.

4:06SPEAKER_02:And my little light bulb went off, and I was like, Well, I'll give it to you for a quarter. And so I would start I started selling these drawings to the kids in class for you know for a quarter or whatnot. And and then I would get go and get uh probably cupcakes and chips and and snacks, all the stuff I wasn't allowed to have. That's awesome. Pack lunch with you know, uh uh whole wheat bread and cream cheese and jelly kind of thing.

4:27SPEAKER_03:Did did this lead to uh actual art classes after this? Like after you saw this, um, or your parents probably saw this town of yours.

4:35SPEAKER_02:Well, I always I just that's the only thing I ever cared about. I would just for instead of a book report, I would do a poster. Um I got I think I got I got in second grade, I got like a fire department art award or some little little trophy. And I was very excited about it for doing a poster. I think it was like a fire awareness poster or something like that. But it just I think from a very young age, I just kind of stuck. It was like this is this is it.

4:57SPEAKER_06:Yeah.

4:57SPEAKER_02:And so I would always draw, and then it wasn't until I was 16. I mean, art was always my favorite class, but it was there wasn't a lot of art class in the school in the school system in Catskill. So there was like a you know, a half hour every couple days in junior high, and then high school, I was really excited to have art class, but it was still maybe every other day. It was like still wasn't like a routine thing. I remember hearing later about kids that went to art high schools.

5:23SPEAKER_02:That's a thing. Um we just had art. Uh, and then when I was 16, for my 16th birthday, my parents got me probably the best present I ever got. They got me uh like a summer's worth of classes at the Woodstock School of Art.

5:37SPEAKER_06:Ah, I've heard of that, yes.

5:39SPEAKER_02:So it's a great little school, magical place in the woods. In like uh it was like a half hour from my house. So my dad would drive me there. I think twice a week I would leave school early and go and go there and just take drawing and painting and sculpture. Uh or no, oh first it was the summer, uh, all the summer classes. I took all the classes I could. And then after the summer, it was just the best. It was so fun. Uh, I was just in heaven, just making art and hanging out with like older, older artists.

6:04SPEAKER_06:Uh right, right.

6:05SPEAKER_02:Yeah. The youngest person. Uh and uh I one other one other kid kind of my age, a little older, but after the summer, it was it was going well, and I got along with the people there, and I was able to come back for like a work scholarship. So I went like the whole school year, I think I would go every two days uh or two days a week, and I would work there a bit and then uh to pay for it. Uh and so I think the yeah, the the year as when I after I turned 16, I was it was the summer of classes and then a year of a little less classes, but inter interwoven with school.

6:38SPEAKER_02:Um and then that was the year I I got kicked out of the art program in my high school. Okay, why my teacher and I didn't quite see eye to eye. Okay. Uh she we started out having a good relationship because she saw how enthusiastic I was about art. And but then it became this kind of weird, competitive, strange, like she started to see that I was really pursuing it, not just like, oh, this is great. And then I wanted to go to Pratt, which she got denied from.

7:11SPEAKER_06:Okay.

7:12SPEAKER_02:And then so she would just she started just being kind of mean to me, and I was like, Yeah, no, why it was like this strange jealousy, or yeah, it was very strange. Um, but I didn't understand it. Makes a little more sense looking back.

7:26SPEAKER_03:Yeah.

7:27SPEAKER_02:Still though.

7:28SPEAKER_03:Sounds like uh big ego, small talent, is what it sounds like.

7:31SPEAKER_02:Yeah, yeah. And so she and she also did student government, so she would give all the student government kids these uh uh free passes on stuff. So other kids just oh take your time, and then she'd go to me and say ten ten points off every day you're late.

7:46SPEAKER_06:Wow.

7:46SPEAKER_02:And I think that was the one that made me snap.

7:49SPEAKER_03:It was so transparent, like it's just yeah, unfair, obviously.

7:53SPEAKER_02:Yeah, it was unfair. And um and I was trying so hard, I was working so hard on that project. It was a it was a postage stamp that was like three feet long, and I was doing it with colored pencils, yeah, like rendered shaded colored pencils, and it was this HP Lovecraft story. Uh I was so excited about it, and then she was making it so hard and not fair to work on it. And I just snapped because it was a cumulative thing and been going, and I just started screaming at her.

8:19SPEAKER_02:Yeah, yeah. Like it escalated into us screaming at each other and um like holding a sculpture of mine, and everyone in the past that I was gonna throw it at her. It was like this whole whole mess. I got suspended for screaming at a teacher. Wow. Uh and then kicked me out of the art program. Uh I got in a bunch of trouble when I was a kid.

8:38SPEAKER_03:But you obviously continued, so Oh yeah.

8:40SPEAKER_02:Yeah. There was there was never a question of what I was gonna do. I mean, yeah, if I couldn't make art, there was I had never I've never had a backup in my life. Um now things have naturally progressed where there's a lot of there was a lot of stuff I'm I'm interested in. I could just be a clear forest every day.

8:57SPEAKER_03:Where did you land then in college? Because if if you well, so didn't complete that program. How did that how did that happen?

9:04SPEAKER_02:It was beautiful, it was beautiful. Uh it was just the the universe being like, here you go. I got kicked out of the art program and and I was just miserable in school. Uh it was not not the place for me. Um, it's just all control, and I just I wanted to be free and do my thing.

9:20SPEAKER_05:Yeah.

9:20SPEAKER_02:And so I uh went to my guidance counselor who I who I got had a good relationship with and told her I was gonna drop out and just figure figure things out. She was very insistent that I didn't drop out, uh, and told me about the bridge program where you could go to college early, which wow until you're I guess you're gonna leave. I don't know. Uh and so I ended up getting to go to I went to uh I was in upstate New York in Catskill, and then kind of straight across the state from me was uh uh Utica, which had a community college with an art school attached to it.

9:56SPEAKER_02:And so which and it they were uh the art school was like a sister school to Pratt.

10:01SPEAKER_03:Okay. And uh so you were meant to go to Pratt, kind of apparently. I didn't. But I probably should have Well, but I mean if it's a sister school, right?

10:12SPEAKER_02:Yeah, there's a connection. It would have been it would have been uh a lot easier for me to to transition from from there. And so I thought that was my my in to Pratt. And so I I got accepted there with a small scholarship, and it was just after I turned 17 when I started. And so I would do I think three days of art classes at the art school and two days of of regular classes at the college, to and I was making up my high school credits and a little bit of freshman year credits at the same time.

10:43SPEAKER_02:And so I got to do my senior year high school at at an art school in college, which is amazing. Uh and uh living on my own and uh first in the dorms, then an apartment pretty quick because I had dorms. Um so it's just I was out of my family and I had sort of a contentious relationship growing up. So it was out of the house, on my own, couldn't have been happier. Um it was pretty amazing how it worked out. Uh yeah.

11:09SPEAKER_03:How how was how was the study there uh in the college? Because you're primarily a representational painter, although very abstractly now. Uh did you get that training there or did that come later?

11:20SPEAKER_02:I, you know, the funny the funny thing about my experience in arts, I went to three art school or I went to a lot a lot of arts, oh, five art schools? I went to the art. I took a few classes one summer at the Art Students League in New York, which is a got a ton of history. It's an old school place. That was kind of stiff. Um, but it's really fun, it's exciting going there.

11:43SPEAKER_05:Yeah.

11:43SPEAKER_02:Uh there was Woodstock, which was amazing. Uh then I went to Utica and it was the Munson Williams Proctor Institute that was like the art school part of it. We got to show in like the art museum in the city there, uh, which was really exciting, like going from our pieces to like Pollocks and things.

12:01SPEAKER_07:Wow.

12:02SPEAKER_02:And so it was a really good experience. And then I went to undergrad and and grad school from there. Um, but that whole time, that whole arc of art classes and schools, I still feel like I'm a self-taught artist because I just uh instructional classes. It never occurred to me to to take any classes that said, here's how to paint, here's how to draw.

12:25SPEAKER_06:Wow.

12:26SPEAKER_02:It was the kind of classes where you just you draw, you paint, and then there'll be a teacher that kind of walks around and uh gives their two cents, which me being me, I I usually ignore.

12:36SPEAKER_06:Yeah.

12:37SPEAKER_02:Um and like if someone tells me to do something, I'm gonna do the opposite. I'm just gonna go, no, no, I'll figure it out. I really love DIY, yeah. I love it.

12:47SPEAKER_03:You like reverse engineering things, I guess.

12:50SPEAKER_02:Exactly.

12:50SPEAKER_03:Yeah.

12:52SPEAKER_02:Let me figure out how to do it my way. If I do it my way, I'm gonna love it and be full in it. If I'm doing it someone else's way, it's not gonna feel right. If like if if I'm gonna if I go in the kitchen, I can cook for hours and come up with all these things and and make this amazing meal. But if someone hands me ingredients and says, make this thing, it's gonna be forced.

13:14SPEAKER_06:And that's so interesting.

13:16SPEAKER_02:And like a kind of bare minimum, like, okay, I did the thing. And so the the trick for me is is to just find my my own way. Yeah. And then I make it mine and and then and then I own it, and then I'm full in everything I do, I I I I do as best the best of my ability.

13:33SPEAKER_03:You really know yourself, is what it sounds like. Like this is already surfacing, uh, because I know you and I wanted to talk about intuition in work.

13:40SPEAKER_02:Um that's been my I feel like m my life has consisted of try figuring out art and myself.

13:46SPEAKER_06:Amazing. Um yeah.

13:48SPEAKER_02:Neither of which will be an ending.

13:50SPEAKER_06:Right.

13:51SPEAKER_02:Like there's no uh it's all all an evolving process. But yeah, it was always figuring out, trying to f find my intuition, figure out what the best thing was to do. Um so when I got when I was in Utica, I would still I would skip classes and and mess around and and kind of do it my way. Uh and I would veer away. I've always in all the art schools, I veered away from all the classes that told you what to do. My favorite was in grad school, where the teacher, you literally just did anything you want, and then you would all get together in class and put all your stuff up, and you would all just kind of chat about what you're what everyone's working on, and you have one-on-ones with the teacher, and he would give you advice.

14:31SPEAKER_02:But for you could tell kind of like where you want, he wouldn't try to say, Oh, this is how I would do it. He was very much like, Don't paint like me. Yeah, paint like yourself, find your voice, find your your style, do your thing, and I'll help you along the way. I'll give you some uh like a little nudge or or some advice. He was great, Rob Clayton. And uh, but yeah, then then like in the in the same thing in the studio. I just I'm always trying to figure out my own way to to apply paint.

14:59SPEAKER_03:Yeah, you're saying something really insightful there that I want to unpack a little bit. So, how how did you discover your artistic voice? Uh, because if you weren't really particularly kind of studying in a particular way, you're kind of self-discovering. You have you seem to have very long studio hours, like your nocturnal habit of of working late. Was it always like that? Even in college, were you just kind of always working? No.

15:23SPEAKER_02:I wish, I wish. Oh god, I wasted so much time. Uh so much time. Uh no, my one of my big problems mostly when I was younger, uh, much less less less now, but uh my one of my biggest problems growing up was that I mean it's funny, I figured out what I wanted to do right off the bat. But then I took it for granted because I figured it out. I'm like, oh, I'm gonna be an artist.

15:49SPEAKER_05:Right.

15:49SPEAKER_02:And I knew it. It was a knowing. I knew I was gonna be an artist. There's no question, there's nothing else that made sense in my world. I was gonna make pictures of some sort. That was my thing. When I was, I think when I was 15, I thought I was gonna have a like a rent in like an office in the in New York in like a in a high rise. Yeah. And I'd like taking the elevator, like it would be that'd be my studio, and I'd be taking the elevator with a suit covered in paint.

16:13SPEAKER_06:Wow.

16:14SPEAKER_02:Briefcase with all my brushes in it, not think not realizing that I'd make my brushes in the studio.

16:19SPEAKER_03:Right.

16:19SPEAKER_02:But I was I thought I'd have a briefcase filled with art materials and uh and all the business people looking at me like, who the hell is this? Like that was my whole kind of vision when I was a kid, which I think actually it did kind of quickly evolve in even back then into wanting a studio with a water view.

16:36SPEAKER_03:Wow. Did you get that? Do you have that now? Yeah. Okay, wow. Audience, he's showing me. You're on a lake? Is that a little oh my goodness, amazing.

16:53SPEAKER_02:My dreams came true for sure. Uh it was uh it was pretty wild. We ended up in um before that our our home here, we were in uh Bodega Bay and then Jenner, and then down here, and they're all on the coast, all studios where I could I could at least step out the door and and you know see the water.

17:12SPEAKER_03:Sounds like a dream.

17:13SPEAKER_02:It is a dream that I was miserable in for a long time for some reason. Uh but um but yes, I I kind of took it all for granted and I wouldn't try very hard. I forgot that I had to actually do stuff right and make art and practice.

17:27SPEAKER_07:Right.

17:28SPEAKER_02:I'm not gonna just start whipping out masterpieces every time I sit down. And so I would I would always wait and build up momentum. I would do nothing, watch crap TV and and just waste time and procrastinate or be self-destructive or or whatnot until I built up this momentum of I need to work, I need to paint, and then I would just go crazy and paint for these big chunks. Um but it wasn't a healthy habit. And I yeah, and it was very frustrating because I would go to paint and I couldn't paint the way I wanted to because I hadn't been practicing.

17:59SPEAKER_07:Yeah.

18:00SPEAKER_02:And it took me so long to realize that. So long. And uh I mean, in all honesty, it took me until three years ago. Not three years ago, maybe four. Uh, but I can remember in my studio, which is just a it's a dream studio. It's like literally like what I would have dreamt of as dreamt of as a kid. It's I mean, I I consider it like a holy ground for for this creation. I have it now, I have it like I call it spatial alchemy.

18:26SPEAKER_04:Yeah.

18:27SPEAKER_02:The way it's set up with of this where I can just it's functional and I can I can create uh to the best of my ability. But flash forward a few years ago, and I was just sitting there playing, I would go in and play like a baseball game app for hours. Too nervous to paint.

18:43SPEAKER_04:Interesting.

18:44SPEAKER_02:Yeah. So it'd be like fear of like, I don't want to ruin anything, I don't know what I'm gonna do, full of kind of like doubt and fear.

18:49SPEAKER_07:Yeah.

18:50SPEAKER_02:And then I would avoid it by doing anything but making art until it was late enough where um where I just go, shit, I gotta work. Yeah. And then and then I would just jump in there and work furiously for for a few hours, usually frustrated again for similar reasons. And um, it was just I've always had this weird mix of intuition, inspiration, and self-destruction.

19:13SPEAKER_03:Interesting, yes. Well, they say that um creation and and destruction are always happening at the same time. Have you heard that theory?

19:21SPEAKER_02:Well, that makes sense.

19:21SPEAKER_03:Yeah. You're kind of describing it right there, which is really, really interesting.

19:26SPEAKER_02:I just saw I just saw this morning a Rick Rubin quote. He said, for every decision, every decision carries with it destruction or or or loss. Loss, which I liked. I think yeah, I think loss. Oh yeah. Which makes sense because you you choose to do one thing and then all the time.

19:40SPEAKER_06:Exactly. Yes.

19:41SPEAKER_02:And um uh oh, but going back to the hours, uh I can't I can't work during the day. Uh there's too many distractions.

19:48SPEAKER_06:You can't work.

19:49SPEAKER_02:Okay. No.

19:50SPEAKER_06:Yeah.

19:50SPEAKER_02:I I tried, I tried my best. Uh there's too many distractions with yeah, just text messages and and calls and errands and life and picking up the kiddo, making dinner, yeah, and then having meals and it lunch was my nemesis. Because I would, if I would start it in the morning, by the time I built up this momentum, all of a sudden it's lunchtime. I have to break and eat and come back and then do it, like get myself back into that mindset again, and then I don't have time, and then I'm watching the clock to be home to to have dinner or make dinner, and I would I found myself after kind of trying and failing in that process, getting really irritable and frustrated, and it was not fun to be around because I was constantly trying and failing to work.

20:34SPEAKER_07:Yeah.

20:34SPEAKER_02:And it was driving me mad.

20:36SPEAKER_07:Yeah.

20:36SPEAKER_02:And then there was something clicked uh a few years ago, and I said, Oh, nights. I work at night, there won't be any of those factors. I can just work. Um, and and my wife said she'd be happy to do the mornings to with with the kiddo.

20:54SPEAKER_07:Yeah.

20:54SPEAKER_02:I get up and and and do the mornings, and then so I so I started working. I'll I'll have a day of uh I get up at 10.

21:03SPEAKER_03:Okay. Yeah.

21:04SPEAKER_02:So that I'm not a a total right, a zombie.

21:06SPEAKER_03:Right. I was just I was just wondering how you do both. How you work at night and also have a family. But you've explained it.

21:12SPEAKER_02:So that's get up at 10 and then and then we'll have a day of I'll try to pitch in as much as I can of with picking up the kiddo and uh and you know, doing meals and this and that and errands and and whatnot. And so let's be a day and and then just taking care of the house. Uh right.

21:29unknown:Yeah.

21:29SPEAKER_02:And just do kind of house house projects and what have you, just life. Yeah. Oh. And then uh most of which I call I call cosmic nonsense. Uh and taxes, bills, uh any of this anything that you would you would tell like an extraterrestrial, and they go, What is that? Money, it's all cosmic nonsense. It's all it's all just ridiculous. And I don't understand why why it we've created this well, I do control, but it's a it's a ridiculous system. Uh But so the day is for cosmic nonsense, errands, family, cooking, all that kind of stuff.

22:05SPEAKER_02:I try to go into the woods once at once a week to do some woods clearing. That's my my kind of exercise and woods therapy. It's like it's very multifunctional, wonderful thing. So I try to do that once a week when I can. And then uh we'll have dinner. And then when Francis is going to bed, uh then I I kind of clean up from dinner and head over to the studio.

22:28SPEAKER_03:Uh so like eight o'clock? Like what time are you?

22:30SPEAKER_02:Yeah, it's usually about eight.

22:31SPEAKER_03:Yeah. Okay.

22:32SPEAKER_02:Some sometimes seven thirty, uh, sometimes a little early, but usually around eight, and then I'm there till three. Uh and ten to two usually is my sweet spot for painting. Wow, wow. Uh because it takes me a while to to get into it. To get into it. And I've I've got this whole process set up that I love. And so the by the time I'm ready to actually paint, it's usually like 10, and then 10 to 2. I just all there is is me in the painting.

23:01SPEAKER_07:Wow.

23:01SPEAKER_02:Um, and and then I'll start to kind of wind down. Uh and I after 2 30, I start turning into a pumpkin.

23:09SPEAKER_03:Right. And way before that.

23:11SPEAKER_02:Like when I start having to scrape stuff off, I'm like, look at it, like, oh shoot, it's too late. Like, it's all gonna crumble. So I'll have to like wrap it up so I don't ruin whatever I'm working on. Right. Uh, and then and then just kind of wind down and and head into bed.

23:26SPEAKER_03:Is there a ritual when you transition from your day life to your night life to your you know, studio life?

23:32SPEAKER_02:Yeah, it's my fate, it's like my favorite part of the day.

23:34SPEAKER_03:Yeah. What is that for you? How do you how do you enter that creative mindset going from the chaos of the day into into you know the studio practice?

23:43SPEAKER_02:Well, so it used to be self-destruction that I thought was uh was for like it was like, oh, this isn't like my palate cleanser uh to wipe out the day and to get into the studio space. Oh my god. Uh uh now it's wonderful. It's uh it's meditation and drumming pretty much.

24:06SPEAKER_06:Oh yes, yes.

24:07SPEAKER_02:Um luckily I didn't get too sick after the show. Usually after a big stressful thing, my body crumbles. So yeah, so when I get in there, I'll I'll kind of just get situated, put stuff away. I've got my I've got a Yoruba Monte tea, um, and I'll like have a little bit of tea uh to kind of perk up a bit. Uh because I'm usually I'll walk in the studio exhausted.

24:28SPEAKER_03:Yeah, yeah.

24:29SPEAKER_02:You're a parent, right?

24:30SPEAKER_03:Even of life. Yes, I get it.

24:32SPEAKER_02:And and did our dinners and and bedtimes are usually the the biggest points of contention. The kiddos just she's amazing. How old is she? Uh seven and a half. Oh yeah. And and the whole day will be incredible. We'll have a blast, and and then dinner and bedtime is just like a switch goes off and it's a different person.

24:52SPEAKER_03:Yeah, meltdown.

24:53SPEAKER_02:But by the time I get to the studio, I'm just kind of like, what?

24:56SPEAKER_03:Yeah.

24:57SPEAKER_02:And so I have some tea, kind of settle in, put some stuff away, maybe pick out some music for the night, and uh and then I sit down and meditate for an hour. Uh and I've got wow. Oh, I forgot to show you. I forgot to send a picture. I didn't I didn't send a picture of the skull I made, did I?

25:16SPEAKER_03:No, you sent me the picture of your um your color wheel, which we're gonna get into because that's freaking awesome.

25:22SPEAKER_02:Uh I'm gonna send you one quick picture because it ties into meditation in a funny way. It was uh sort of because of the meditation. So I started using um resin incense for uh Oh, you did send me that.

25:39SPEAKER_03:Okay, yes. Let's go.

25:41SPEAKER_02:Yes. So I would uh I got some some of these resins that I was using, they you you kind of put them over a tea light and it melts them and it smells it smells great. And uh I didn't ever I didn't never realize what frankincense and myrrh were until I I got the incense and they're they're resins.

25:59SPEAKER_06:Wow, I I never knew that.

26:01SPEAKER_02:And so I was so I was you know melting frankincense and myrrh. Oh, for your meditation practice? Were you doing that?

26:07SPEAKER_03:Oh, wow, okay.

26:09SPEAKER_02:It was really neat. But then I had these little chunks of pine sap on my on my uh counter from the just from the from the forest outside of our house that had fallen. And they're just really neat little objects and they smell great, uh, the sap. And so I I just I was I thought, oh, could I use that for for incense? And so I took broke some little pieces off of the of the uh of the sap and put them in the dish. Instantly favorite out of all of them.

26:37SPEAKER_02:Better than frankincense and myrrh. Wow. Gifts to Jesus. The um it's just amazing, it's this warming smell. It just smells like fresh cut wood. And like I would put my nose over it and inhale it, and it felt like I was breathing in. I mean, you are breathing in the forest, it's amazing of the of the tree, like the tree blood. And I breathe them in, I breathe them in and and it just kind of warms your insides. It's this wonderful feeling, and I I love it so much, and it melts and turns into this amber liquid.

27:08SPEAKER_02:And I was looking at the li, I just melted, and then it dries and solidifies really fast after it after it cools. And uh and I was looking at it and I was like, and it for keeps the shape of like what the metal that's under it, and uh I was like, Oh, I wonder if I could melt that down and pour it into a mold and make forms out of it.

27:27SPEAKER_06:Wow.

27:27SPEAKER_02:It was like after I meditation, I was looking at it, and I was like, and with my patience level, instead of painting, it was this is like a week, a week from the show.

27:36SPEAKER_07:Yeah.

27:36SPEAKER_02:When I just need to be painting like mad. Right. Oh, it's too late to even to be painting, but I was. I was painting until two in the morning the night before. Yeah. Um, but so I like I was like, I need to I just need to see if this works. And so I got all my I can't throw anything away, so I have all these little scraps of of the melted, melted sap, these little shards and stuff, and so I put them in a little pot and I melt them down, and I had it this little sphere silicone mold uh in the studio for a different project that never happened.

28:03SPEAKER_02:And so I pour it in there, and I ended up with this little sap orb, this little sap sphere, and it was amazing. And you carved it to get your skull? Well, no, I the sphere is just the sphere. I actually put it in for the show, I put it in an oyster shelf. It ended up kind of representing birth.

28:20SPEAKER_03:Oh my gosh, how beautiful. Wow.

28:22SPEAKER_02:It's like uh the oyster and and the black pearl.

28:25SPEAKER_03:You're blowing my mind, Kai. Wow. Okay, keep going. So amazing, you're so creative. Yeah.

28:30SPEAKER_02:Um, that's what happens with intuition. Yeah, uh, I was not that creative in my self-destructive era, that's for sure. Um, that's for damn sure. Uh as the opposite. And so I had the sphere, and then Ryan, Ryan, the uh the gallerist who I'm at who's where I had to show it right now.

28:48SPEAKER_03:Yeah, the Ryan Graf contemporary, right?

28:50SPEAKER_02:Right. Yeah. He came over to check in on stuff and to take a few things with him, and and uh and I was showing him the sphere, and he goes, Oh, I should have brought I've got these silicone skull molds, I should have brought them. And it instantly clicked. It was like, that is so beyond perfect. Um I was gonna make a head. I wanted to make a little head sculpture. Yeah. And I was gonna have sap heads, which I still will.

29:12SPEAKER_03:Yeah. You have to.

29:14unknown:Yeah.

29:15SPEAKER_03:To go along with your paint blob heads, right? Whatever you call that.

29:17SPEAKER_02:Yeah. Um and so, but it instantly clicked because this the forest taught me about death. Uh there was there was one day especially out there where instead of cutting clearing trees, I was just sitting with the journal and and writing like the whole day. Um, I had had some some mushroom microdoses.

29:37SPEAKER_07:Yeah, okay.

29:38SPEAKER_02:But not just microdose. I wasn't like yeah, it was very subtle, but it was enough where I didn't really want to cut trees down with the state I was in.

29:48SPEAKER_07:Right.

29:49SPEAKER_02:I I just felt felt bad. I was like, I can't cut, I can't. I just started see empathizing and seeing them as beings.

29:57SPEAKER_06:And yeah.

29:58SPEAKER_02:And I I was like, I can't cut down a tree. And and so I was sitting there and then just felt like it was just receiving information from the trees and noticing and observing and the mycelial network and and the energy and the balance and seeing how other trees other trees would grow up uh stronger and in in the gaps where ones were cut down and oh yeah, and there was and then more uh uh more more diversity in the in the forest life where all these these new kinds of trees would grow in instead of just the pines, because our forests grew in very overgrown after a fire.

30:32SPEAKER_05:Yeah.

30:33SPEAKER_02:And so it's not a hell it's not healthy. It's it's very they're all closed in the trees can't grow. And um, and it's only bishop pines, like unhealthy, just kindling bishop pines.

30:44SPEAKER_03:Material, right, yeah.

30:45SPEAKER_02:And and so I'm trying to clear out all the small dead ones and let the bigger ones be able to spread out and grow healthy, and then and then all of a sudden all these other trees started kind of growing up. It was really exciting. Um and the I just didn't see I didn't see evidences of evidence of life in the in the woods when I started working out there. This is four years ago, and uh and now there's just mushrooms are growing, there's an owl that lives in the forest.

31:11SPEAKER_07:Wow.

31:12SPEAKER_02:There's a mountain lion there for a chunk.

31:14SPEAKER_07:Oh my goodness.

31:15SPEAKER_02:And then there's deer and foxes and raccoons and all kinds of stuff, squirrels and um oh, we saw a scorpion one one day. Did not know scorpions here even. Yeah, yeah. Like, whoa, that's a scorpion. Uh as wild.

31:31SPEAKER_03:And uh well, this skull, the skull of yours, back to that. Like when you showed me that picture, it it reminded me of the crystal skulls. You've seen those, right? The ones that have been discovered and we still don't know who made them, right? That's what exactly what it looked like to me. I have you heard about that? There's there's been several crystal skulls across the world that have been that have been found, and I think in Latin America, uh there was one.

31:53SPEAKER_03:If you Google it, it's a thing, you know, and they don't know how it was made, etc.

31:58SPEAKER_02:People have mentioned the crystal skulls, and uh my head just goes to crystal skulls that are in like a crystal shop.

32:04SPEAKER_03:Yeah, no, this is like this is really very cool stuff. Like they they have no idea how it was made. Like I'm I'm pretty sure that that there's multiple ones, but the one that I'm familiar with at least is from Latin America. Maybe it's Aztec, I'm I'm not quite sure, but it's it's ancient. Yeah, you should definitely Google that because when I saw that I was like, whoa, this is so cool.

32:22SPEAKER_02:You know, like it clicked right away because it was it was this really epic day where yeah I felt like I learned like this this beauty and importance of death and how it's we should we should celebrate it and not be afraid of it. Right. Uh not not be so sad and and grieving necessarily, but it's just an opportunity to celebrate the person's life and to celebrate this transition of energy.

32:44SPEAKER_03:Yeah.

32:45SPEAKER_02:Um it's not really death, like the I mean the body dies.

32:48SPEAKER_03:Right. But the spirit is is you know always remains. Yeah. It's invincible, yeah.

32:54SPEAKER_02:It's spirit just is going to a magical place, it's going home.

32:57SPEAKER_03:Yeah, exactly.

32:58SPEAKER_02:And then we're all everyone's sad and mopey and and and devastated. And it's like, no, it's it could be this beautiful thing, and and and so I came up with all these ideas like um soul composting or like so cool. Yeah, and it's just this writing and writing, writing in my journal.

33:17SPEAKER_06:I can see that, yeah.

33:19SPEAKER_02:By the end of the day, I I I had less of a fear of death than when I from when I woke up because it was just sitting in the woods.

33:25SPEAKER_03:So if you had less of a fear of death, then you were really living, right? Like literally, right? Yeah. That's it.

33:31SPEAKER_02:I was like, I don't want to die.

33:33SPEAKER_03:Yeah.

33:34SPEAKER_02:But I know that when I do, it's gonna be pretty amazing. I'm curious about it. Um I think it's gonna be amazing, whatever it is, and to learn and to have whatever insight comes with that.

33:43SPEAKER_03:And um I'm right there with you. There's a there's a um, I don't know his name, but there's an an Oxford professor of of religion or something, and he wrote this absolutely beautiful poem that I can send to you after the podcast. Um but it basically the poem he says, you know, uh, you know, basically don't don't mourn me, you know, because I've passed, you know, you know, uh speak of my name in in the same way you used to say it, you know, talk, talk to me, you know, it casually like we used to.

34:08SPEAKER_03:And you know, I'll and he ends with it like I'll just be waiting in the next room for you, you know. And that's that's beautiful. Like that's how I think of it. Like that's literally what it is. Like they're just kind of waiting in the next room, and then eventually we'll be there, reunited. And yeah, I'm I'm right with you. I don't have that fear of death either, you know. I do find it fascinating.

34:27SPEAKER_02:Yeah. And and so, yeah, as soon as Ryan mentioned the skull, like that all just click. I'm like, perfect! Like that's the exact thing that it should be.

34:35SPEAKER_05:Yeah.

34:35SPEAKER_02:Um, and so I I mean I had a week until it opened, so I rush shipped some silicone molds of my own and and then went out. And as soon as I had that in my head, I only had like a little some scraps of sap on hand. And then I had that in my head, and I went for a walk the next morning, found this giant piece of sap. Whoa.

34:53SPEAKER_03:What what are the chances of that, right?

34:55SPEAKER_02:I know. I was like, oh, perfect! That's the whole thing. Uh and then right out front of my studio, I found another good chunk that I actually that was the chunk I use. Yeah. Uh just this this one nice medium chunk for the for the first skull. Um, so I have to make some more. And but yeah, so I just broke up the sap and melted it down, poured it in the mold, and it was the most satisfying thing, taking it out of there. It's like it just felt like amber, like this giant amber.

35:20SPEAKER_02:Yeah, little pieces of bark in it from remnants, and it's it's it's so cool. And I I uh so then I inlaid a little LED light into a stone.

35:30SPEAKER_03:I was gonna ask you if you have it illuminated, yeah.

35:32SPEAKER_02:But put it on there, and so it's it lights up from from underneath, which is so it makes it look kind of cool and magical, and and you can see all the little bits inside it, the depth and and the volume and everything.

35:41SPEAKER_03:That's awesome. Have you always done sculpture? Is this has this always been part of your practice?

35:45SPEAKER_02:It well, it used to be. My uh when I started, I liked it, I liked sculpture in high school, and then when I went to the Woodstock school, I took a sculpture class there that I loved. Oh yeah, after after Utica, I I ended up I did it for a year and then I dropped out. Uh it was an acid acid trip told me to drop out, and I dropped out. I committed. Right, right. And um uh and then I ended up, I took a year off and learned, oh, I don't like real life and responsibilities and and rent and bills and working.

36:23SPEAKER_02:I was a telemarketer and I worked at a gas station. I was like, nope, not working. Uh so I went back to school at uh SUNY Purchase in New York just above New York City. And while I was there, I took uh a bunch of sculpture classes and it was so fun as this this kind of older, very old school sculptor guy who taught all the classes, and I worked my way up to the like the top one that was bronze casting. So I've got my bronze bronze guy in my studio still from that class.

36:48SPEAKER_02:Oh wow, wow. Um and uh and it's just so fun just using your hands to create a thing. Yeah, not not needing really tools and and just it's very simple, and you s and you see it as you're doing it. It made it made a lot of sense to me.

37:02SPEAKER_05:Yeah.

37:03SPEAKER_02:Um and uh my um but my mom again, my spite. Uh my mom told me that she thought I was gonna be, she didn't think my paintings were strong, and she thought I was gonna be a sculptor. And because of that, I was like, nope, painter it is.

37:19SPEAKER_04:Right.

37:21SPEAKER_02:Uh I always I always saw a painting like that just seemed like the natural way to go. Yeah. And uh not that there, but there's room for both, obviously.

37:29SPEAKER_03:Right. And are you are you working from your sculptures? Because let's let's back up a little bit and let's talk about those paint blobs that you do like what do you call them? Your your bus where and is that acrylic? I call them forms.

37:41SPEAKER_02:Some are mostly there's a so the I just sent you this morning there was uh an AI picture and then a picture of a little sculpture.

37:51SPEAKER_07:Okay.

37:51SPEAKER_02:Um and so when I started oh, just one one quick uh note.

37:57SPEAKER_05:Yeah.

37:57SPEAKER_02:Uh I've been wanting to sculpt again for decades, uh, because I I veered to just painting.

38:04SPEAKER_07:Yeah.

38:05SPEAKER_02:And I kept wanting to get back into sculpture. And it it never quite happened. And then uh there was about a decade when I was in my lab, my previous gallery. Uh and every show I would like in the middle of the show, I would go to the gallerist and and her call and be like, What do you think about sculpture? Because I'd be like, Oh right, I might I need a physical thing in here, not just paintings.

38:26SPEAKER_07:Yeah.

38:27SPEAKER_02:This is a perfect excuse to get back into sculpture. And she would represent other sculptors.

38:31SPEAKER_07:Right.

38:31SPEAKER_02:Uh she probably had people that that that would that wouldn't like them and uh could have an audience for it. And uh every single time she would just kind of swipe that away and say, just focus on the paintings. Sorry about that.

38:45SPEAKER_06:Yeah.

38:46SPEAKER_02:Uh we'll get to that later. Yeah. Just focus on the paintings. And it never happened. And I was always kind of disappointed.

38:51SPEAKER_07:Yeah.

38:52SPEAKER_02:And uh I also at that point thought to do sculpture I had to make a form out of wax or clay and have it cast in bronze, which for this it would be a couple of thousand dollars easy for right case. It's a big investment for something you don't know if it's gonna sell or yeah, you know, whatnot. And um, I've I never could never really quite afford it. And so flash forward to maybe two years ago, or a year and a half ago, close to two years, a friend introduced me to the AI, uh, AI art, and I had seen a New York Times article.

39:25SPEAKER_02:I hadn't tried it yet. And so I got the Mid-Journey app and started messing around with with AI art. The whole for the first weekend, me and the whole family were huddled around the computers making like rainbow unicorns for Francis and stuff. Uh or like crystal unicorns and all kinds of things. Yeah, yeah. Weird, silly things. It was really and it was really fun. Then it we started making images like like in the style of uh of like Monet or whatnot, and there's these beautiful paintings that it was making.

39:56SPEAKER_07:Yeah.

39:56SPEAKER_02:Messed up, messed with my head a lot. It was like, okay, a computer can make a painting better than I can, and I've been working at it my whole life. I mean, you know, it's a little JPEG, it's not a right, but still, like it was very humbling. Yeah. And uh the there was like this sort of a learning curve with it where it took me a while to adjust to like what it was and what it means. Eventually, it made me feel m sort of more connected to my work and more like to show how special if we could do because we can do anything too.

40:27SPEAKER_07:Right, right.

40:28SPEAKER_02:Yes. But we do put our attention to, it made it that kind of that much more special.

40:32SPEAKER_06:Yeah.

40:33SPEAKER_02:And and it shows it kind of shows you by example, like, look, the all the anything can exist, anything you can imagine can exist. So then when you see what people do, it you can really see what makes things human.

40:46SPEAKER_05:Yeah.

40:46SPEAKER_02:Uh and it is, it's more a lot of it is the mistakes and growth and and just that expression of like how our perspective, how we see the world, yeah, from our from our perspective. So it really kind of shines a light on on how special it is to be to be an artist or to create.

41:01SPEAKER_03:Are you using AI as like at all as some some kind of composing element?

41:06SPEAKER_02:Well, yeah. So I I started using it as a um as uh to make color reference, yeah, which is really exciting.

41:13SPEAKER_03:And feeding your own work to it, right? To do that? Uh-huh. Yeah.

41:16SPEAKER_02:Well, first it was prompt, which is where the forms came from, because I would I wanted, I didn't want to copy it. I think I tried copying one of them, and it was like, oh no, this is this how works. This doesn't have a soul. It doesn't have yeah, it doesn't resonate, it's not coming from the right place, it's not the right process, which is great to see. It was like, okay, good. Uh now I'm not even gonna be tempted to just, you know, make the eye right follow some trolls on Instagram called me after doing that, but I don't.

41:44SPEAKER_05:Yeah.

41:44SPEAKER_02:Uh and but so I'd make my own color. Usually I would have color reference that I would find from various places just uh as like a guide, and and I would have that up next to my reference photos, and I just use I use found photos for reference. And um I uh so I started making these like abstract forms for the color reference. So I'd make head like forms out of different materials and with different colors, and I would try to add little emotional cues to what I was trying to try to go for.

42:14SPEAKER_02:Yeah, and it would come back with these incredible, incredible results. There was one that was it was a visual. I was trying to make this one painting like reflected, tarnished reflected metal or something, and I couldn't quite get. I could never quite get it. And then by accident, I made a reference photo that was just what I was going for with that painting. Just like just little little details of it.

42:35SPEAKER_06:Yeah.

42:35SPEAKER_02:But I just like I saw it popped up. I'm like, oh, that's the painting. That's not painting. I was so excited.

42:42SPEAKER_03:And I mean, it was nothing like the painting, it was just this cylinder with light reflecting on it, kind of but the way the light was reflecting gave you an idea of how to apply that to your work.

42:52SPEAKER_02:Yeah, yeah. And it was it was just the just like the random amount of inspiration I needed for one element of the painting.

42:58SPEAKER_06:That's awesome.

42:59SPEAKER_02:And so it's just such a liberating thing to be able to make my own color reference and inspiration for painting. So I come into the studio, sit down for an hour, have all my my visual references, color, color and everything, and then I just tack that up next to the painting and and just go. And I don't have to think as much. It just makes makes my job a lot easier. And then my my my eye is just kind of bouncing between the painting and like little glimpses.

43:24SPEAKER_02:I don't I try not to look at the color references that much. I noticed it was really interesting uh when I started using the AI in particular, I'd have a photo reference. I also painting from an AI photo didn't seem didn't seem quite right either. Didn't have quite as much of a a soul to or as a as an anchor. So I'd have a photo of a person, a little snapshot, and then I would have a few AIs around it. And I would notice that there was nights where I barely looked at the reference photos, but then after the night was over, I would look, and it was like this really good representation of like combination of blurred mashup.

44:00SPEAKER_02:of all the stuff that was on the wall, just the way it would come through my subconscious. And like work its way in. So there'd be like a little orange from one and a little this and just little bits and pieces from each one. Yeah. And it would kind of it looked like I I kind of combined them all in a in a in a program and to make the painting. And you could see you could see traces of where all the stuff came from, but none of it was like exactly like it was in the in the pictures.

44:25SPEAKER_02:And so it it was a really fun process. So I and I've gone back and forth. I had at one point I think I'd like I'd have 20 different pictures on the wall. It was overwhelming.

44:33SPEAKER_07:Yeah.

44:34SPEAKER_02:And then now it's it's I try to do a lot simpler and sometimes I won't have any anything up depending on the stage of the painting.

44:40SPEAKER_03:Is there a filter of imagination that you're also doing like in the moment while you're doing it you you did mention that you're uh having all these references up that you're working from kind of cuts down on the thinking. I'm wondering how much of it is in the act itself. Like are you making decisions that are you know color shifts or value shifts that are based on imagination.

45:00SPEAKER_02:Nothing nothing that I paint is directly from the reference material.

45:05SPEAKER_03:Okay. So so yes so there's a filter there. Yeah.

45:08SPEAKER_02:There's these the reference images and then it goes through my filter yeah and and onto the canvas or or panel. So there's no like specific elements that I'm I'm not like copying it like okay I'm gonna get this part right there.

45:20SPEAKER_03:You're not observing yeah direct observations.

45:22SPEAKER_02:Yeah in like a a general inspired sense. Yeah um it gets me it gets me on the right track. I have trouble starting sometimes I could do anything like anything could be anything like what should it be? So it get kind of gets me going and then I just go off on tangents and yeah and whatnot.

45:40SPEAKER_03:And experimenting it's I mean obviously a lot of experimentation.

45:44SPEAKER_02:A lot of experimentation yeah and uh and you usually by the end of the night I'm like okay that didn't work.

45:50SPEAKER_03:So back to it these paintings that you're doing I mean I'm looking at one right behind you. They're really really large. Are you working like in multiple sessions? Are you like completely reworking them in between like you you talked about the destruction and the creation like it feels like that's also happening in the work itself in the paintings like as they emerge does that happen?

46:11SPEAKER_02:Yeah usually they they tend to look in between sittings like from one sitting to the next yeah I'll end up kind of repainting it um there's a lot of paintings where I I go to find I go to look for my reference photo and I can't find it because it's gone so far from the original source that doesn't resemble it at all. Even some of the color I can't find in the references. Like what was I using for this book? What was I doing? And then I'll make a new thing or find a new photo that's kind of like it and use that.

46:41SPEAKER_02:So none of that is too important. Yeah just how how it's feeling and uh but so when I started making those the AI forms I would make them out of all these different materials within within the AI. So like you know a head form made out of stone or or cloth or clay or or whatever it is. And I made what this one out of fabric. Uh so it's like a I think I just said muted rainbow tone head like form.

47:07SPEAKER_03:Yeah so cool.

47:08SPEAKER_02:With like above lighting melancholy tone or something maybe and and it came back with this exactly that. And it I just loved it so much as an object but then it's just this JPEG this little low quality JPEG and I just I was looking at it it kind of stopped me in my tracks and I was like I need to I need to make this wow this needs to be real. This needs to be a thing this can't just be a picture. I need to see what this feels like in real life and so I googled fabric hardener since it since the thing was was fabric in the picture.

47:40SPEAKER_02:I Google fabric hardener and I found this product called Paverpal which is a is a fabric hardener but it also hardens any material any organic material anything that's not plastic. Wow okay it'll you can you can use it to to adhere make forms and it was just this world opened up because up until that point I thought sculpture was going to be very traditional materials in this big process having to bring it to to this a foundry and it's this whole thing and as soon as a process leaves my studio it's gonna get harder and harder for me.

48:13SPEAKER_02:It's more more and more barriers of oh I have to drive to meet this person and set up a time to meet them and then wait to see the thing and so I got this material and it's incredible. You just dip fabric in it lay it over a form and it dries starts drying really quick and then it dries like rock hard and pretty much waterproof. So I got some colored fabric scraps and like a few a few materials together and then I made this little this little fabric head form that I mean it wasn't exactly like the the AI but it was really close.

48:43SPEAKER_02:I was so happy how close it was yeah that's the thing I have it like in my hand yeah from AI from this a prompt and I mean this whole process and then I I ended up having this this real thing in my hand that that I've never quite seen anything like it. Nothing like it existed at least in my world before right that I've seen either yes and I was just over the moon I couldn't believe and then within a few weeks I think I'd built a whole another part of my studio just for these forms because I started playing around all these all these materials.

49:15SPEAKER_02:And so I built a whole like a a new table and shelves and this whole area and set up a whole a whole area of my studio whole wall that was sort of just just kind of stuff there. And I moved everything around reorganized it and I had this whole sculpture world. Wow yeah and then uh and so I made a form out of cardboard paint rags uh like used oil paint rags and then like just the the kind of these pink washcloth kind of paint rags I used used those for one just like all kinds of stuff and I've I have shelves of all these different materials to to use that I that to make things and so all of a sudden it was like I can just make a form out of anything.

49:55SPEAKER_02:Wow uh yeah since it's plastic you can drape stuff over plastic and it pulls right off and so I I've been I was using you know plastic that I'd gotten from packaging and stuff like that reusing it to make these the bases for these forms. I used like an Amazon box for for for the cardboard form. And I was just so excited I got to reuse all these materials that I would normally be throwing away.

50:17SPEAKER_03:It's so it's so meta. It's so interesting because like obviously in doing that you can work from that right and and you do.

50:24SPEAKER_02:Well that was as soon as as soon as I started doing the form I look I I I'm doing the form and I look over at the paintings and go, that's what they need. It just like instantly clicked. Yeah and so yeah so then the the quality of the form started informing the paintings and then they started taking on a different tone like like with this one yeah with with a lot of the chunks and the color and the way the color is it was how I was working on uh with the forms of just using pieces of fabric.

50:52SPEAKER_07:Oh I love that.

50:53SPEAKER_02:Put them in there.

50:54SPEAKER_07:Yeah.

50:55SPEAKER_02:And so the the sculptures and the paintings are constantly kind of playing off of each other back and forth. Yeah. So the paintings will inform the sculpture like there was a a head that I just did where it was it's a it was one of the main parts of the show. It's as big like maybe twice twice as big as a regular head this big head and it was a wire form and then that I put just some like muslin over with the with the Pavert ball so I had this sort of lumpy head like form no real features.

51:24SPEAKER_02:On top of that I had gotten this um it's a heavy bodied acrylic made by this company Gaffrey and you can it comes in like these piping bags and so you can just pipe it out and it dries exactly like however it comes out so you can have these giant masses of this paint and it dries as is it's like a sculptural paint. Really cool. And so I was taking that and just using a palette knife to sculpt the all the features of the of the head so then I had this like big head with these kind of palette knifey gestural features and and then on top of that I painted it with oil and I was trying to recreate this one painting the same with the same color color motif as this one painting for thematically.

52:05SPEAKER_02:And uh so I started I painted it kind of like it was but I was blending the colors sort of like the painting was and it didn't look quite right. And then I started painting just each chunk of paint uh that I'd used for the the palette knife to make I would paint each swipe its own color and move around which reminded me of these kind of things. And really quickly it went from me not liking it at all and going it shouldn't be part of the show to realizing like oh work on it like you would work on one of the paintings with the blotches.

52:37SPEAKER_02:And so make these these individual blotches and then as soon as I started doing like trying to riff from the paintings then I was like oh that's it and it was fantastic with the variation of color and how it would jump around and since I was just using the texture that was there it kind of it was it fit into this one way of working and this it was sort of contained the marks. And then I so I did that and then look back at the paintings and go and went oh okay now I get to do it.

53:05SPEAKER_02:Very seamlessly just feeding off each back and forth and back and forth. It's so kind of an invaluable it's this incredible resource and inspiration in the studio that all came from this this one random you know AI picture that I whole new medium this whole new avenue of working magical how it all took form and and and started.

53:24SPEAKER_03:Yeah I interviewed another artist um David Schaeffitz and he also uses AI for prompts as well uh as like sketches and then you know works off of that you know but he says it is very much the artist medium because nothing is limited you know it is unlimited right so it's like what you're saying it completely opens up new worlds yeah new ways of thinking so many of them where I go oh right I could do that or like yeah just little things like just like using that color over this color or something or yeah uh I feel like I'm I've I've always had this constant battle between the right and left yes where there's a very strong voice going make it look like it is right make it look like the picture and and so I'm not able to open up yeah as much see all these different things that I could do.

54:09SPEAKER_02:Right. I'm just like oh I should do I should do this. And it drives me nuts. Yeah.

54:14SPEAKER_03:Well that's not art right like that's just copying right and at one point you you kind of let go of that I guess I think I think that's also a process for most representational artists you know when you when you show someone your art if it looks like something yeah they're gonna go wow that's amazing you did that.

54:30SPEAKER_02:If it doesn't look like something they go oh I don't know what that is they don't really and so yeah with that feedback I think over time it it sort of forms that that path that neurological path yes yes things so that people will like it so that yeah will think you're a good artist and whatnot.

54:48SPEAKER_03:What what do the what do the heads represent to you?

54:51SPEAKER_02:They're all self-portraits really yeah oh yeah even the landscapes I look back a while ago at at some older work that I didn't feel was that strong or maybe I was just I just felt bad because it was too homogeneous maybe I wasn't I was kind of feeling bad about some of my past work and I looked back and it clicked to me it was this was a while ago but it clicked and I didn't think it was personal enough like it was just painting for painting sake kind of thing and uh yes okay not connected that's illuminating yeah I was feeling more connected yeah with the work and but then I realized looking back I was like oh these are this is all my old work is it's a diary.

55:32SPEAKER_02:I could show that if I went to a therapist yeah I would just say this this is this is my emotional history. Oh wow because there was there was times when I was feeling lost and disconnected yeah and all my paintings were in this gray void and desaturated. Then I was feeling a little more kind of all over the place and and kind of frazzled and what should I do and not very grounded. And then my paintings got all fragmented and and kind of and broken up.

56:04SPEAKER_02:And so between the way I paint and the colors I use and and what I'm painting there's all these these ways to these tools of expression that subconsciously they're very much expressing exactly what's going on in in my mind. So interesting yes so for a very long time I was painting making these paintings that were very personal but on an unconscious level. So my subconscious was was getting everything in there. I wasn't saying oh I'm gonna paint this because I feel like this so they didn't really have a lot of intent but they were very much coming from from my from self.

56:42SPEAKER_02:Yeah and and so they're representing the just the mental state that I was in. And so there was that there's actually there's there's this one piece that I did I forget if it was 2010 or 2012. I think it's 2010 it's called the disappearing boy it was like the one painting that people would buy prints of you know for yes yes and it was one of the main ones and uh I I was really excited about it when I painted it. I was in Bodega Bay when I did it in my studio up there and was so stoked about it.

57:08SPEAKER_02:It was this big painting and really happy with how it came out it it was this pretty desaturated figure and there was like a foggy light gray background and it was overtaking the the and he was kind of fading into the fog. And then after that I completely got lost and I went into the I went into the void and I was and I was lost for a good chunk of time for various reasons. And and then it was just recently last few years where I started to find myself again and rediscover myself.

57:37SPEAKER_02:And so that in the show now there's a big painting uh six by seven feet and it's called the reappearing boy instead of the disappearing boy.

57:45SPEAKER_06:Oh I love that.

57:46SPEAKER_02:And it's and it's this dark void kind of behind him that he's emerging from and just all color this like flickering color it looks like it's glowing because it it was all most of it was painted on a bright background and then the dark came in and so the bright color just kind of screams forward and it looks like this like kind of energetic aura kind of thing. And yeah that one was huge. That one I that's so beautiful I think I started it there was like an AI that popped out that inspired it but it was this very the original painting happened it was like a sketch painting for it and it had came out so quick it was like I need to do this.

58:23SPEAKER_02:And and then I was I painted I painted it in one night it was like a sort of like a painting study on panel and I then I was staring at it for a couple days and then it before it clicked and I was like it's the reappearing boy and because I'd go in I've been going through this a lot of new experiences so beautiful yes oh my god that's what it is I'm coming back well and I was I was so over the moon excited I was like okay I'm making this one big and uh so I just finished it finally uh and I'm I'm so excited about how it came out.

58:53SPEAKER_03:Oh I love that on so many levels. Can you talk um can you talk about the colors? Because you sent me this beautiful color wheel and I've never considered colors like this before um the way you sent it to me where you've you have labels, you've attributed certain things with each color. And I think it's kind of like a a key for interpreting your work as well. So can we talk about that?

59:14SPEAKER_02:It is it's my it's my studio color key.

59:17SPEAKER_03:I'm just trying to find it's key to self is literally what's labeled which is just amazing.

59:22SPEAKER_02:This is so that's my the a rainbow series that I just I just finished that's where the color key came from uh from that series I started I had all those the six paintings they were all just sort of like regular paintings all probably flesh flesh tones I stopped painting with flesh tones a few years ago and so yeah like 2012 I think I saw like a real change in the work I think that are 2012 stuff started getting more fractured um a little more color mostly mostly just it got it got fractured I was always paranoid that I started adopting all different styles of the different artists that were in the gallery that I joined.

1:00:02SPEAKER_06:Okay.

1:00:03SPEAKER_02:Because I got into like my dream gallery.

1:00:04SPEAKER_03:Yes or Anne Gale and Alice Knevsky Okay okay all right I I was seeing a little bit of that and I was wondering if if that if you had studied with any of them or since you're you're on the West Coast, right?

1:00:15SPEAKER_02:So whether or not you knew Anne Gail and I I've met her I I I try not to have too many regrets. One of my regrets is not talking to Anne Gailmore we were at an anniversary party for the gallery. Yeah we're sitting across from each other and it would have been so fun to chat but I was in a weird place and I ended up just I I don't think I've been away from uh my wife had and I hadn't really been away from each other much. We usually do stuff together and she was at home with with with her daughter.

1:00:41SPEAKER_02:And so I was just like live texting the event to her. We're just texting the topic and and my my social awkwardness just kind of like yeah made me retreat and I really wish I chatted with with Anne more.

1:00:52SPEAKER_03:She's she seemed really I think you should reach out because that's I should that would be a wonderful conversation between the two of you for sure.

1:00:59SPEAKER_02:Yeah I I just just recently I've started getting the itch to connect uh inkling to connect with with humans.

1:01:04SPEAKER_03:Yeah I get that because you're so intuitive so you're very connected to your own internal thinking I totally get I totally get where you're coming from I totally understand it.

1:01:14SPEAKER_02:You know I'm just coming out of about two or three years of sort of mental solitary confinement where I was like as little external sources as possible I just wanted to I was just Did this start with COVID this self-reflection like deep really deep self-reflection. It I it's funny it seems silly to say I've I've always felt a sense of uh self-reflection that that's always been like that was the only only thing I thought my paintings were about just self-reflection but in a very ambiguous yeah abstract kind of way none of it was too intentional and I never thought I had anything to say because I always kind of felt like a piece of shit.

1:01:51SPEAKER_02:Yeah just I was just wasting so much time and just I wasn't I didn't feel like I was being myself or living up to to my you know potential right um wasn't my best and so I was always always felt sort of some guilt about that.

1:02:05SPEAKER_03:And well I love that you're sharing that because honestly I think it's probably something that a lot of people feel you know the imposter syndrome and everything right that comes along with being an artist.

1:02:14SPEAKER_02:I still have that. Yeah wow that encourages all of us yes for for a while uh for a while I was I had I actually after after joining the galler uh the gallery with these artists that I really looked up to yeah I one of the artists Alex Kanevsky who I'd I hadn't known Ann or a lot of the other artists but I'd known his work before a little bit. Yeah I'm familiar with him he's fantastic yeah yeah I was I was really pissed the first time I saw his his art because I was like shit that's what I want to do now I can't grow into like that's what I want my work to be exactly what I can't do it now.

1:02:51SPEAKER_02:Yeah I remember being annoyed and he inadvertently I turned him into and I didn't know what it was for so long. Took me a really long time to figure out but he would pop into my head constantly in the studio and and it was just it was I don't I don't know him well enough to yeah have him in my head who he really is as a person. I've just met him a few times through gallery functions and the first time I met him I said do you not like my art and what was his reaction uh he's like who are you I've never gotten that before that's an interesting question let's let's talk about it um it was funny I I I felt I was just talking to my wife about it I it could have been this really beautiful conversation but I was by that point hence me asking him that question out of the blue right uh I was probably like three sheets and yeah uh I wasn't in the state to have a conversation uh and I remember being frustrated that I couldn't form the words that I wanted to form at the moment like wasted opportunity but uh but I would have them in my head and it was it wasn't him it was it was my a visualization or a little avatar for my my own voice of of doubt of thinking that my work looked like other people's or it wasn't good enough yeah uh because I liked his work.

1:04:03SPEAKER_02:And so he just kind of fit this it was just this this persona.

1:04:08SPEAKER_03:I find that really interesting it's kind of almost like you're getting you were getting nudges that you could be doing something maybe bigger or more ambitious or more in keeping with your own artistic vision. You know like maybe maybe that's what you were sensing.

1:04:21SPEAKER_02:Well I just I had to work stuff work stuff out and and find my own really find my way. Uh and feel like I was being my more of my my authentic self in and out of the studio. And uh yeah I and I it's been a while since I've since that's popped into my head.

1:04:39SPEAKER_03:Yeah have you you've heard the term shadow self right like that whole thing?

1:04:43SPEAKER_02:Well the the blue the blue uh painting in in that series is is shadows uh and the shadow well shadow work is what's kind of started where I'm at with painting there was one painting in particular and I forgot I'll I'll get back to the rainbow and the color yeah um I get distracted easy that's great there was there was one painting in my last Dolby show uh where it was it had started as just a painting where I I have an image that I'm drawn to and I just kind of start painting.

1:05:17SPEAKER_02:The whole process is pretty kind of messy and intuitive. I start with just blobs there's no real sketches and proportions it's just kind of forms. Oh that was I was gonna mention that when I paint it feels to me like sculpture. Like the sculpture world and the painting world aren't that different. When I'm painting yeah I feel like I'm moving the painting around to find the form. It's not as much like I'm painting a picture. Yes like I'm sculpting with paint and uh that's why I really like the more the hand tools because it feels like I'm moving stuff around with with my hand not not being controlled by a by a brush.

1:05:49SPEAKER_02:And uh I was working on a paint this painting and I just learned about shadow work as a as a therapeutic tool and so just following emotions and going back to their home and and more embracing them and and giving them a hug and transforming them yeah transforming and releasing it and yeah and uh and it it's and so I was trying to do that in the studio a bit and so I was working on this painting and and I said oh yeah let me just let me give it intent and it pretty quickly I'm like oh I think this painting's about this uh as as as one of one as one one arm of my uh trifecta of self-destruction and I was like I think it's about this and look this color is is kind of the path forward this color is going looking back and I kind of associated different parts of the painting uh with with this this narrative and I just sort of had that in my head while I was working on it and it was one of the most incredible things that's ever happened to me in my life I fixed the thing by painting the act of painting I I fixed this it was a a 30 year bad habit so and I tried and failed to stop multiple times couldn't and then I'm working on a painting and thinking about it and and thinking about this the shadow kind of stuff and I wasn't fighting the thing it wasn't like this is bad I need to stop thinking about it and it was and it was a painting that I was excited about and and something just clicked I kind of formed like a visualization for it and worked through it a bit and kind of found this other angle and then I just felt something click.

1:07:26SPEAKER_02:It was different than I've ever felt in regards to it before clicked into place I felt that that was that I did it that that was it and I just started bawling. It was like for a half an hour I was just walking around in circles in my studio kind of painting a little bit just just bawling. Wow and then there is a song on that was just so perfect I was like this is exactly how I feel right now and I walk over and I look at the song title and I just I just settled started to settle down and I look and it said almost familiar and as soon as I read I read it I just started bawling all over again for like another half hour because I was just I was becoming familiar with myself again yes yes learning who I was again because I lost and so beautiful oh it was and and that and that was it and that was I fixed it it was it was three years ago.

1:08:14SPEAKER_02:Yeah that was it uh it worked it was incredible nothing I've never I've never experienced anything like that in my life I couldn't believe it.

1:08:21SPEAKER_03:That's absolutely absolutely beautiful. So the this color let's talk about this let's jump in.

1:08:27SPEAKER_02:So then the color the color painting started as this blind intuition where I just started work I I had all these paintings around and and uh I just thought for some reason I just said oh I'm gonna do a a rainbow series like a monochrome painting for each color of of the rainbow it popped into my head in a weird way where I was like you sure like okay I don't know why I I kept trying to figure out what it was I thought maybe it was a color exercise of just breaking me out of my my like using more neutral tones and maws and stuff and yeah howdy and I wasn't really painting with green or yellow much at all even though I had a bunch of them on my on my my paint rack.

1:09:06SPEAKER_02:And so I was like oh I guess I guess it's just a way to break out of of my color funk and just use more use more color. And but it was very much like my like a mashed potato my mashed potato mountain from close encounters of the third kind where it's like I don't know why I'm doing this but I'm doing definitely doing it. And but I would look at it like almost every night go, okay we're doing a rainbow series like what is this? And it was so different from anything else in the studio at the time.

1:09:28SPEAKER_02:Yeah it really stood out. And then there was this one day and I think I worked on it for almost a year like that. And uh there was one day where I was reading uh I try to do solo days whenever I can it they don't happen often but I'll just pack a bag with everything I need of food and water and some art supplies and some music and whatnot just have my like my kind of go bag and I just take off in the morning with no plan and I'll just find somewhere to go.

1:09:58SPEAKER_02:We live in a dream world pretty much trails and beaches and all kinds of stuff. A lot of nature we're in the wood we're in the woods. And so I'll just drive and then go wherever I like I'll just kind of let the universe take me somewhere essentially like whatever feels natural I'll just kind of end up going somewhere without overthinking it or having like an agenda or a plan and I'll just spend a day wherever it is doing whatever whatever uh feels right.

1:10:25SPEAKER_02:Um and so sometimes I'll read sometimes I'll draw sometimes I meditate or is or rock hound or just wander around and think the varies usually I I try to write a little bit at least and uh every one of them has been incredible.

1:10:38SPEAKER_03:I haven't I haven't done many it's hard hard with life and kid yeah it sounds almost like an artist retreat really like a mini artist retreat.

1:10:46SPEAKER_02:One day it used to be just while Francis was in school said I had to like rush back to pick her up.

1:10:51unknown:Right.

1:10:52SPEAKER_02:And so but there but so one of the days I I ended up at this one beach I had never been and I wanted I'd wanted to finish this book. I I could never have time to to read and so I just wanted to finish this book and it was just a young adult book that was set in like the native within the world of like the Pacific north northwest indigenous culture. And so it was about this this like little this uh or young girl discovering uh kind of her sense of of self.

1:11:22SPEAKER_02:Twilight right no it was uh it was one of the it's a I sent you the picture of my stack okay and I'm blank it's in my studio I blank it on the name of it now. Um it's a cool a cool name wild I'll point it out to you but uh and so there's this part of it where this this girl climbs up to the top of this mountain and she's alone and she ends up getting uh taken on this like sort of vision quest thing and she leaves her body and the per the being that that uh was her like tour guide kind of person who is leading her to to see something uh she's like freaking out because she sees her body and he's like oh you thought you were the body right he's like no no no no like he's like you don't know about like the breakdown of self or you know the parts of self and and he kind of broke down the self into five parts and as soon as I read that it just clicked I was like oh yes wow totally that's the self I was like oh I love that it just it really resonated and out of the whole book that one part I just I was so in love with and then that night I get back to the studio and I walk into the studio and go oh that's the paintings it just like instantly clicked where it was like that's that's the rainbow it's the self it's all the components of self um but there was there was one it was five components of self and I had six paintings and so I sort of tried to intuitively match the component with with the paint with each painting with each color like whatever kind of felt right to me and then and then I was looking at them going okay which like what's missing from these components of self?

1:12:55SPEAKER_02:Is there anything else that would that I feel is part of me that's not represented here that makes up myself. Yeah and and it was right when I for the first time that I could remember had a real sense of purpose a real spark uh and and I had a purpose that wasn't like make paintings and sell paintings. Like I it was more of like that service yeah to humanity kind of purpose where it was like I just I want to save the world I want to I want to inspire I want to do like it was all these really good admirable things that were the my the new reason I wanted to paint where it wasn't like oh I want to mix up to sell it like I really want to mix up to help the world and to be positive sources of inspiration and this this whole thing.

1:13:38SPEAKER_03:Well they definitely are what let's let's tell the listeners what they are so so the red red signifies for you body?

1:13:44SPEAKER_02:Yeah so there's them so red guy showing us some pictures red is red is for those who are listening yeah red is red is body uh orange such as our physical vessel of a meat sack of a body okay uh orange is uh purpose or spark yellow is vitality or personality how we how we present ourselves green is gift or uh I like to think of it as gift gift of like the gift of life of being able to to have this experience and so heart as our sort of as our our our engine our source of energy uh blue is shadows or subconscious and purple is spirit it's kind of like the chakras yeah that was the funniest part I didn't know know anything about chakras at that time and then bit by bit I start learning more and that is amazing it's like he channeled that and I was like I was like oh shit they actually like really pretty much exactly line up with all the chakras with the meanings and the colors yes yes that's really crazy guy that's crazy to have the meaning originate in this this book that just text then get associated with these colors that I'd start randomly to pair them just intuitively whatever I whatever kind of seemed like it suited the color it wasn't supposed to be in a certain order and yeah and then yeah and then they line up where I was like I started learning about chakras then I come back at the studio and go, oh look at that.

1:15:11SPEAKER_02:Like it's like amazing yeah lay it right over.

1:15:15SPEAKER_03:That feels like you were led to that honestly that's pretty amazing.

1:15:19SPEAKER_02:Yeah it was awesome it was really cool and so yeah as soon as I had the meaning that I I think I sw yellow what's yellow now was orange I was like oh he doesn't feel like spark or purpose so I switched him to to the vitality or personality and then I found a different painting to fill in for for spark and it was I just realized like fairly recently that the only male portrait was was yellow but for personality the rest are female portraits oh interesting and then and then just the personality of how we present ourselves to the world that's the male one I was like okay now I gotta go find out about past lives and yes yes oh my gosh wow it was like it was like well I got a guy I got a nice perfect and uh but I was like okay so there's stuff to explore there just within that but uh yeah it was it was pretty amazing how that whole series came about of kind of blind intuition and faith and and then just bit by bit it came together.

1:16:15SPEAKER_02:And so it was a two year process by the time from when I decided to do the rainbow series to when I had it figured out and then finished it it was it was like a two year span. Wow uh I was because I was then I was nervous to uh I didn't want to ruin them and it was like this precious thing. Right right and when I body was the first one I worked on with intent where after I realized what what it was because it none of it was finished. And when I went to work on body uh it was I hadn't anticipated it but it ended up being a really intense night in the studio because of the shadow work component.

1:16:48SPEAKER_02:It was I didn't I wasn't used to having to work on paintings with that specific intent. It was more intuitive and when I started painting pretty quickly I realized like oh I've got a lot to apologize to my body.

1:17:01SPEAKER_04:Right.

1:17:02SPEAKER_02:And I was just a heavy heavy heavy heavy heavy drinker for a long time. So it was just poisoning my body on a daily basis. And uh and so it was a really it was kind of an intense beautiful night in the studio where I felt like I was just communicating with my body. Yeah through the painting as as as this vessel and so these little like devil horns on it like appeared.

1:17:24SPEAKER_03:Oh I think I remember seeing that yes.

1:17:26SPEAKER_02:It was like it was an accident. Yeah I didn't intend it but it just happened and then there was a part of the color from a previous stage of the painting it was kind of green more green. Never even thought to paint over that because it was all supposed to be it was just supposed to be all red. It was more like pinky magenta and then I left the one part so it's afterwards I realized that like it seemed like more of a like a tarnished like maybe from the booze and stuff like this tarnished rusty oxidized kind of part but it was it was kind of amazing how it happened and then I was extra nervous to work on the rest.

1:17:58SPEAKER_02:And and probably personality and uh I think I ended up going a little lighter on the rest of them. But they seem to have very come together very quickly after that right like kind of like an explosion of creativity once you kind of figured this out this color component of the it sparked the rest of the color exploding uh because it gave it meaning um and then as soon as I had that that breakdown that I made I made uh I eventually made that uh the painting that I sent you of the circle of the color circles overlapping because that turned into my color key for the studio so then now when I make a painting so like when working on this no I can after I'm it's usually after I'm done working sometimes during I'll be able to sort of read it like tea leaves kind of where each color has its own meaning.

1:18:42SPEAKER_02:And so it's like oh yeah the blue here is probably that and that's why the the red is coming in over here and so there's all this like psychological deeper meaning just just through what the colors are in the in the read of it which makes it really fun. Uh and it and ends up being very accurate a lot of the time. There was a a painting I did about anger which was another leg of my trifecta self-destruction and the way the colors ended up which were not intentional colors uh because I started it on just this like random colorful cloudscape kind of painting and and then I after I was I worked on it for a sitting and I was looking at it I was like oh my god look at that it's like the percent personality coming through here going through shadows coming out as anger like it was had this whole color narrative that just happened.

1:19:32SPEAKER_03:I don't normally end my podcast without saying goodbye to my guests. However, my conversation with Kai Samuels Davis was so engaging that we ended up talking for hours. So I'll be releasing not just one but two episodes on him. The second episode will drop in a couple of weeks and will be released as my June episode. Now that you've heard from Kai himself about his journey of becoming an artist on rediscovering himself and how in the process he found his own artistic voice.

1:19:59SPEAKER_03:I urge you to go see his work in person or online during his emergent solo show with Ryan Graf Contemporary, which has been extended through June of 2024. You can find more information about the exhibit and on Kai himself in the show notes. So be sure to check there. Here are some of the gems he left with us today that you can use in your own creative practice. Kai says he can't work during the day with all the interruptions of modern life which he playfully calls cosmic nonsense.

1:20:24SPEAKER_03:He found that even lunch would often break up his momentum so he began to work a creative night shift which fits well with his family life he works from 8 to 3 a.m and says that 10 to 2 is his sweet spot as far as productivity. I think this schedule could be a game changer for some of you and at the very least has me rethinking how I can rebalance my own personal schedule. Kai uses a daily ritual to transition into a studio time which is a great practice that we can all adopt.

1:20:51SPEAKER_03:He uses meditation followed by drumming and finds that a cup of yirba mat the tea also helps get his creative juices flowing. Kai began experimenting with AI via the mid-journey app, initially as a fun family activity of creating crystal unicorns for his young daughter but this play led to some really significant inspirations in his work. Imagine what it could do for yours. Kai says when you see what people do as contrasted with AI, then you can really see what makes us human.

1:21:19SPEAKER_03:I find this thought so beautiful Kai's initial artistic forays into AI were to use prompts for his color references when working Kai uses many references, both photo and AI and because he doesn't work directly from these references and instead passes these images through the filter of his own imagination, the result is something altogether unique. In fact, Kai tends to repaint his composition so often in between studio sessions that he sometimes has problems finding the original references he began with.

1:21:49SPEAKER_03:And this is because his work has evolved way past us. Kai prefers working with what he calls hand tools when painting, using such tools as wedges, squeegee, and brayers instead of brushes because he equates painting with sculpting utilizing these tools helps him to feel like he is sculpting with paint. Another wonderful tool that Kai uses is clearly self-reflection and it is this deep connection to his inner thoughts and his intuition that has made him take such great leaps in both his life and his work and I find this truly inspiring.

1:22:17SPEAKER_03:I want to thank Kai Samuels Davis for this mind-blowing conversation on the connection between intuition, creativity and his own work. Thank you for talking with me Kai I truly enjoyed it to the rest of you thank you for spending another hour of your day with me I also want to personally thank the artist Daniel Shadwell for leaving me a five star review. Such reviews help more people find my content so please leave me one if you've enjoyed this podcast.

1:22:42SPEAKER_03:With that I'll sign off until next time creatives