Bangkok, Thailand. 15 April, 2023.
Songkran is ending and here’s a little painting from 2014 that is currently in storage somewhere in Europe, at a storage facility that had all its customer data stolen by hackers, because of course it did, it’s 2023.
Starman, 24x30cm, oil on linen on HDF, Budapest 2014
I’ve always had mixed feelings about this painting. On the one hand, it’s definitely got something; on the other hand, it doesn’t particularly fit in with my overall body of work. It’s a bit too dimensional for the abstract figurative stuff, and way too figurative for the purely abstract work, and it isn’t exactly conceptual despite the nod to Mr. Bowie. And I admit that the palette-knifery is a little unsubtle. And really, does it look a bit like a Manuel Neri?
On the other hand, yeah, it’s got something, though I don’t rule out taking another crack at that lack-of-face. In real life you don’t see the brushwork so much, but still.
Alrighty then, what does the AI think of this?
Stable Diffusion Img2Img; Prompt: “Starman”
Whoa, that’s a trip. I think I feel a series coming on.