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On one occasion an online friend found a video to recognize my birthday. As you might have guessed already, the video involved dots. It had a variety of colors and was animated. To remember that event I went back to the video.




acrylic on canvas, 5" x 5"

First I chose colors from the video to include in my painting. I then went about playing with the juxtaposition of colors as I rendered backgrounds and dots to create larger dots. The result of my experimentation is this painting.

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Back in 2007 I went to a free screening of the film “Grindhouse.” In the middle of the film there were faux previews. Separating them from the two films were “Intermission” and “Feature Presentation” title animations. They were the same ones used back in the early 70s when there were still drive-ins in New Orleans. I remember the titles many times when I went with my family to drive-in movies.


acrylic on canvas, 5" x 5"

For this painting I used the bright colors that I saw in the titles. I fragmented their revolving shapes into pieces inside four squares. In each square I mixed a bit of the bright color with a neutral color to make my dots.

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Many years ago I went to a screening of John Waters’ film “Hairspray.” When the new version came out, I saw that too. In the new version a 50’s star symbol was used on the set of the television dance show. The poster for the new film had a lot of bright colors. Anyway I wanted to use a star symbol with bright colors.


acrylic on canvas, 5" x 5"

First I separated the canvas into four squares of color. I then created a star shape over them with various pastel colors. Lastly I filled in the rest with pastel versions of the background colors. I’m a sucker for bright colors.

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Four years ago, while The Ogden Museum of Southern Art I noticed a large abstract painting by Kendall Shaw. His use of squares in patterns intrigued me. Before leaving, I bought a catalog of his work.


acrylic on canvas, 5" x 5"

Recently I saw the painting again, at the Ogden. Also, I looked at his other paintings in the catalog I bought. Finally, I settled on some colors from his palette and started painting dots. As much as I liked his uniform squares, I let my dots vary in size.

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In the fall of 2007 I saw the film “The Diving Bell and the Butterfly” at the New Orleans Film Festival. It followed the story of real-life Elle editor Jean-Dominique Bauby who had a stroke rendering him only able to move one eye. He narrates the drama while interjecting flippant remarks.


acrylic on canvas, 5" x 5"

The opening credits began with floating circle shapes in front of a blue-green background. Lighting and focus fluxed as words and names appeared on screen. Once the introduction concluded there was a blurry transition to faces speaking above his seeing eye. His running commentary started there.

Needless to say, I was moved by the creativity of the film’s animated title sequence. I used the colors I saw in the movie to create a new dot painting. All the paintings in this bunch will be divided into four squares – some by their backgrounds and others by their foregrounds. So, I’ve now completed the first one.

"e" Series Reaction

Before going forward, I thought I should explain the paintings I call "e" Series Reaction. That way readers know what came before the new batch I plan to call "e" Series Action. The irony is that I'm having trouble moving forward on this one. I've been feeling tired a lot this week. If this keeps up I may have to change "Action" to "Inaction."

"e" Series Action

The photos below are not new. They are photos of my 5” x 5” canvases with a first coat of paint. Some were completed in the group I call “e” Series Reaction. The rest are waiting to become “e” Series Action. It seemed only natural that I keep pairing two titles that go together, somehow.

Whereas the first half has a diamond design, the second half is quartered – divided into four parts. Well, at least that’s my plan. Who knows what will happen in my process. At this point I'm ready to dive in and see where this batch takes me.

The themes in these future paintings still involve events from 2007. Apparently that year was more visually stimulating to me than others. Sure, I keep adding themes to my theme list, but my 2007 list is still longer. Enough already, I need to resume painting.