I was born in Tampa, Florida, USA in 1958. My biological father was a test pilot for the U.S. Air Force. We never met. My stepfather, Sidney Ashmore adopted my brother Steve and me when I was four. Sid was a WWII vet, "self-made" man, who worked for Hertz Truck division and later Pepsi-Cola. My mother, Virginia, had started her nursing degree when she was young, but put it on hold when she married Rodney O'Connor. She didn't complete the degree until I was in High School, some twenty years later. She eventually received her R.N. I have one full brother, Steve and six stepbrothers and sisters, making me the youngest of eight, and the only one of the bunch to graduate college and move out of Florida.
I'm single, living in Brooklyn, and if I have a hobby, it must certainly be taking care of this four-story house that my three roommates and I live in, which takes constant maintenance, as it is now one hundred and twenty eight years old.
The Asian influence of the "Blue House" series stems from my fascination with fonts and characters of foreign languages. My first "brush" with Asian characters was at the Asian Society here in New York, where I was temporarily employed as the assistant to the Lighting Director for dance concerts and events in the Society's in-house theatre. They had hung an artist's work in the lobby that consisted of abstractions of real characters. I have never gotten over how beautiful they were.
It took quite some time to learn how to free myself up enough to do abstract expressionism. One would think that it would be quite easy to let go and have at it, but I had a lot to "unlearn". The freedom is exhilarating, but when you then consider that one has to take into account balance and form to make the characters pleasing to the eye, while at the same time remaining spontaneous, you can understand that it is not as easy as it appears. The paper takes weeks of preparation; with a minimum of ten coats front and ten coats back for the paper to lay flat enough to be able to be framed. The calligraphy takes but a brief second, but it requires a certain moment of Zen for all the elements I mentioned to come together. I simply close the door to my studio, and turn off any radio, fan, etc., and concentrate for a little while.
The most frequently asked question is "do they mean anything, are they real characters?" The answer is no, they are completely abstract. They are a picture of a moment of creation. And I might mention that the low contrast between the background color and the black is quite intentional. Not only does it make the background appear to "glow" from behind, but it forces the viewer to come in close in order to see the detail. It brings you into the painting. And finally, I am often asked what the gold rectangle represents. It is the third element, it is the element that gives the painting asymmetry, and yet it's final balance. In the art of Japanese flower arranging, an even number of elements is never used. The goal is to create balance with an odd number. The calligraphy and the dot are the first two elements, and the gold is always placed last to balance the painting.
bio in German