The Meaning

About eighteen years ago in my art studio in the Crossroads Art District of Kansas City Missouri, I named my gallery “Innuendos” because I started to see that my work became all about the inspirational spiritual, psychological, and lyrical insinuations I refer to while developing my body of work.

This piece sums up the meaning behind my work of over twenty years. If you look at the artwork in my gallery, you may understand why this is so.

Inside the spiritual world of my artistic illustrations, lies the expression of dichotomy between good and evil. Sometimes I see this struggle inside of me and other people around me who are willing to embrace “Innuendos” that I believe are all around us as they come from God.

As the arms of The Son pull the stone lettering together, you can see the evil ghosts, zombies, and ghouls haunting the human souls as they fall from between the letters. This insinuates that as people embrace His signs of life, by the way He reveals Himself to us, evil loses power and falls away from us forever.

The Process

I began by sketching out the lettering of the piece, and then sketched all the zombie-like characters which fall from each letter. The arms of Christ where sketched to make it look as if He is pulling them together. The outline of the clouds was then designed around the arms.

I used the wiping effect with mineral spirits and a mixture of black, white, and cool grey oil paint on the lettering. I did the same for the clouds and the blue sky with only black and cerulean blue hue paint. I finished outlining the piece with three different shades of red and yellow. Finally, the background was finished with mars and chromatic blacks and titanium white for the stars.