Sitting with Myself - Portrait of the Artist

Oil on linen, 53 × 43cm

Professionally framed in a white oak floating box frame

During a period away from the studio, I had to face a hard question: who am I, if not an artist? If not painting?

Rendered in black and white, this portrait was painted feverishly over the course of a month, in long sessions that followed the loss of a close friend.

When I'm not creating, life starts to lose its shape. But you can't force a creative season when you're meant to be still. There's something to learn in the stillness, something about coming to terms with who you are outside of what you make.

When I painted this portrait, I was exhausted. There was no light, just a relentless search for meaning. Painting it was cathartic, and it let me see myself more fully. Rick Rubin has described the way gazing at the ocean can offer a truer reflection than a mirror ever could, and painting this portrait became my own version of that same gaze, a way of seeing myself more honestly than any reflection allows.

"There's a reason we are drawn to gazing at the ocean. It is said the ocean provides a closer reflection of who we are than any mirror." - Rick Rubin, The Creative Act

I am in white, a thread that ties back into the existential undercurrent of the piece. Around my neck, a gold necklace catches the light and sways, echoing the glittering, restless motion of life itself. A shell necklace sits alongside it, a reference to my reflection in the ocean, a place where I have always felt grounded and a place of true self.

Months spent looking at myself in an ever-evolving portrait, and I wanted only one thing from this painting: honesty.

"We tend to think of the artist’s work as the output. The real work of the artist is a way of being in the world." - Rick Rubin, The Creative Act