What Sparked you to be an artist? 

The Detroit Industry Murals by Diego Rivera. I remember being blown away by this work when I was 6 years old growing up in Detroit and visiting the art museum. The scale, details and intensity - the intermixing of ancient/symbolic imagery with modern life/technology. That overwhelming power and vision that an artwork can convey certainly inspired me in profound ways as a young person.

What was the first art piece you’ve sold?

I’ve been selling my drawings and paintings for over 20 years, since I was in middle school. It’s hard to remember the very first actual sale, but here’s a painting that was probably one of them, “Business Man”. Clearly inspired by Basquiat, it still hints at the expressionism and movement I continue to explore in my work to this day.

What is your most meaningful art creation to date (December 2022)?

I spend up to a year reworking the same drawing over and over again to create my 1-minute animations, these are my most important and meaningful pieces. My most recent 1-minute piece “Open Eyes” is currently the most meaningful to me and was a big inspiration for my “Time To Be Happy” design. (Open Eyes: https://vimeo.com/758721685) 

Every piece I make feels one step closer to distilling my vision and pushing the limits of what the moving image can be, so my newest work always tends to be the most meaningful to me. Using the central image of the eye throughout, "Open Eyes" focuses on the central themes that I address in my work - looking deeper, heightened awareness, spiritual enlightenment, self discovery, the incredible depth and complexity of consciousness. Likewise, my "Time To Be Happy" clock reinforces and builds on these themes. For me, art-making is a discovery process, my work reveals itself over a long time, frame by frame, without any predetermined outcome. When it's really going well, it feels like I'm not actually making the work, but channeling something deeper through me. My 'artistic journey' has been one of pushing myself to "open my eyes wider, to see deeper and more clearly, to wake up and see the truth - to seek revelations that slowly reveal themselves over time through intense labor and reflection." As an animator and visual artist, I am an illusionist, I am hacking the eyes and brains of my viewers to create experiences that go beyond just sight, but "seeing" in a grander sense of the word.

How would you describe your experience working on the clock?

The work I'm famous for - I scan a photograph, then I work on top of it with whiteout and ink. Most of my collectors and fans have never seen the physical before. Now, with my clock creation, I can show people what the work looks like in real life.