This painting was an experiment.

Everyone who’s seen it thinks it’s ugly. A few have come right out and said so, bypassing diplomacy altogether.

Even when someone tries to go the polite route, I can tell by their reaction. There’s a sort of flinch. A mental recoiling backwards.

I call that a success.

There’s something to be said for getting a visceral reaction out of people, regardless of which direction it goes. I find this much more satisfying than a tactful but dispassionate “that’s different.”

Do I think this is a great painting? No, I do not. For one thing, it’s small, only 9 by 12 inches. Now if it were huge, say, 9 by 12 meters, I might feel otherwise.

Then it would be monumentally ugly, which would definitely take things up a notch or two on the impact scale.

Maybe next time I’ll experiment on bigger canvas.