Hello, I'm David M.
David has an MFA in creative writing rather than visual art, and his training as an artist has been haphazard and sporadic. In the last 15 years, however, abstract painting emerged as an irresistible obsession. As a writer of essays, poetry, and particularly haiku, he has a deep and abiding love of words, but words and paint regard life differently. While words tell stories seemingly no matter what, paintings evoke alternate realities, ambiguous feelings, and unaccountable discoveries. David’s abstracts defy narrative. Instead they ask viewers to create their own forms and stories. They offer meaning by implication. A high school English and history teacher for more than 35 years, David is the son of a watercolor artist painting landscapes, and his first forays into art began in doodling. His affinity for patterns arises from observations of design and variation in the natural and human-built world. Literal references sometimes seep to the surface in his work—maps, cells, logos, machinery, graffiti, foliage, calligraphy, peeling paint, and building faces—but his art is improvisational and begins with a few simple “rules” and evolves by breaking those rules. To David, all art feels like doodling. He loves working in mixed palettes and watching simple lines, shapes, and forms morph into finely detailed, complex, and interrelated arrangements. Though the idiosyncrasy of his artistic voice is plain, his work is diverse. It focuses on instinct and experimentation, a determined effort not to repeat or imitate his earlier efforts. Primarily using acrylic paint, markers, ink, and mixed media on aquarelle paper, David also paints on unstretched canvas and uses collage and various resist techniques borrowed from batik. In addition to painting, he is a book artist, and his current project on Instagram is filling 5” X 8” moleskines and homemade books with daily art. He hopes to offer these books as unified pieces that develop—as a symphony might—themes and ideas expressive of a particular period of his artistic progress.