Here’s the finished commission piece – I shipped it off last week. The studio seems dreary without all this orange on the wall…

I don’t tend to be a believer in inherent aesthetics. It’s my supposition that we bring to an artistic encounter our own cultural biases, aesthetic training (informal or formal) and — ultimately — personal taste — that has been developed more or less deliberately throughout our lives. That is to say, nothing is beautiful in its own right — it only is beautiful if we decide it is so.

When Steven LaRose’s blog page loaded yesterday morning, I greeted it with a sharp inhalation and then let out a low four-letter word. More on this later, but the image to the right is of the painting I was reacting to: Glittering Generalities and Blazing Ubiquities.

I follow his blog pretty regularly, I have seen a lot of his work (just saw some in person at Snoose Junction here in Seattle recently), and generally have a high regard for what he does. Which isn’t to say that I like every painting he does… but I have an appreciation for his work and his process and his aesthetic. And, most of the time, I do like the paintings he makes.

But this painting was different for me — and I could immediately recognize that he had stepped over some threshold. When I clicked on the comments, it was evident that the body of folks who frequent Steve’s blog felt the same. I don’t think they are shining his shoes, either… I get the sense that this is genuine.

So here’s the question: among an admittedly self-selecting group that already appreciates his work, how is it that one painting could garner such a consensus in the comments? Is there something inherent about this painting that makes it special — something separate from the aesthetic experience we bring to it?

I really don’t want to believe that to be the truth, but I’m hard-pressed for an answer otherwise, shy of sheer coincidence.

You can read all the comments here.

It takes so dang long to get to the point where I can start putting color on a panel, then the rest goes so fast… I’m a little farther along than his image, but here’s the first passes of color on the 42″ panel. The tag on the wall is the mass tone of the color I’ve mixed — it’s primarily pyrrole orange, modified by diarylide yellow and transparent yellow iron oxide.