Divine images are visions placed directly in the mind; they do not pass through the senses. Rather, they rain down from heaven. And so I will tell you about the images that have rained down onto me:

At the beginning there was a fruit – a juicy fruit, blooming, somewhere between nut and seed and flesh. A flower. A bud. At once ripe and ripening, at once full and yet still in a state of becoming, with leaves that are roots, roots that grow infinitely in a loop, into leaves. Behind it, day and night pass at once.

Day and night are always passing at once, if you zoom out. If you zoom out – multiple times can happen at once. Day breaks in one hemisphere and night falls in another. If you zoom out – think about it, everything is happening all at once. All realities are happening at once.

All timelines and all possibilities are happening in parallel – layered time – folding in on itself –

and all happening at once.

Happening and happened and yet to happen.

Each moment is pregnant with possibility.

Each memory folds in on itself. Each ending touches a beginning and with each touch: change.

Memories are dynamic. I worry about touching them too much, lest they be shaped, lest they be molded into something other than what they once were.

Everything happens at once.

Day on the left, night on the right. Times pass into each other and collapse into one image, one still image. Stillness. I think about that with painting: how to capture all of this, all that is happening, in one still image? Is it possible?

I attempt to capture multiple times in one frame.

Night on one side and day on the other. Sun and moon, moon and sun, in the same frame. Time touching, edge to edge.

Time folding into itself, just like the leaves and roots of this plant. Some have called it the tree of knowledge.

My MFA Thesis Show, “fantasy is a place where it rains” opens tomorrow at New York Studio School (8 W8th Street) from 6-8p. If you are in the city, I hope to see you there.

If you’d like to order one my exhibition booklets, you can order one here. There are only a few left so don’t wait! Thanks for your support. xo

Order Book

I self-published a book! I am also graduating!

I am delighted to share, “fantasy is a place where it rains” — an exhibition book to accompany my MFA thesis show of the same title. The show opens next Thursday, 5/14 at New York Studio School with a reception from 6-8p. It runs until Wednesday 5/27 and is open daily, 10a-6p. The book is available at the link below!

Order my Book

The book is a signed and numbered edition of 100 and combines a creative nonfiction essay of the same name with photos of paintings from my show. The essay was written as part of my MFA thesis and is intended to accompany this new body of work, which is the culmination of my past two years at the studio school.

Both the paintings and the essay explore what it means to see, where images come from and touch on the themes of motherhood, fertility and legacy. The existential, and deeply personal question, at the heart of the work is: can painting be enough?

If you are in New York next week, I hope you will join for the opening reception. I’ll be showing around 14 brand new works, alongside solo or duo shows of my 12 MFA classmates. Show flier below. I look forward to sharing more soon.

Order Book Here

Other news…

If you are in Austin today and tomorrow, I am showing the below painting, “malasana” with Half Gallery at Friends Fair. It is a fun (and free!) art fair hosted at The Loren.

We are in Room 201 and the fair is open today, Friday 5/8 from 12-7p and tomorrow, Saturday 5/9 from 12-6p. This is my first time showing with Half Gallery and I am delighted!!! Participating artists: Maud Madsen, Angela China, Benjamin Staker, Leonard Baby, Robyn Aspen, Gary Kuehn, Tyson Mason, Hiejin Yoo, Alex Maceda, and Jonathan Edelhuber.

If you are in New York City next week, in addition to my thesis show, I will be returning to Future Fair again, this time with Loft Projects. I’ll be showing 3 new paintings, including the one below, in a salon-style show, “Elastic Realities,” in the Special Projects Section booth E9. The fair runs May 13 - 16 — I hope to see you there!

If you are interested in work from either, reply to this e-mail and I will put you in touch with the galleries.

Thank you and so, so much love. xo

I hope you will join me for the opening reception of my two-person show with Liam Murphy-Torres at New York Studio School (NYSS) next Friday, February 20th from 6-8p. A belated birthday celebration of sorts!

I feel lucky to call Liam a classmate, painter-peer, and now friend. We are in the same MFA class at NYSS and came in with (what we thought were) very different, and sometimes directly opposing views on painting, art, and the art world. Over the past year, via lengthy conversations and the occasional heated debate, we have come not only find to mutual respect, but a lot of common ground.

On a hot summer Saturday, I went to draw from the Rodins at the Met Museum with our classmate Holly and ran into Liam — where else? — drawing in front of a Cezanne. We started discussing how we have very similar inspirations, goals, and beliefs about the nature and promise of painting, often starting at opposites ends of the abstraction-to-representation/experience spectrum and ending up in an other, criss-crossing, but always traversing the same space. Out of that conversation came the idea for this show.

When curating, I often find myself biased towards visual aesthetics — palettes, compositions, work that looks cohesive together. This show has been a joy for its reliance on contrast and concept, and its invitation to the viewer to sit with the work and find visual connections that might not be readily apparent.

Liam is currently in a wonderful three-person show at JJ Murphy Gallery here in NYC, I was recently in a group show at Harper’s, and both of us have exciting opportunities lined up after graduation. It feels like a particularly beautiful point in time — the last semester of our program — to share a space like this knowing the opportunities for our work to be exhibited together will likely be few and far between. I hope you will join us for the opening or come see the show during daily gallery hours, 10a-6p from 2/20 to 3/4.

Lastly, I am indebted to Liam for the writing below! You can find him on Instagram here, Substack here or at his website here. We’ll be following up next week with a full list of available works to those who are interested. If you’d like the list, please reply to this e-mail.

All the best,

Amac

Two Ships Passing in the Night

Alex Maceda & Liam Murphy-Torres
February 20-March 4, 2026
Opening Reception: Friday, February 20, 6–8 PM

New York Studio School Student Gallery
8 West 8th Street, New York, NY 10011

This two-person exhibition pairs drawings and paintings by Alex Maceda and Liam Murphy-Torres. The show’s title refers to the artists’ divergent processes: one moving from experience toward abstraction, the other from abstraction toward experience.

Maceda begins with ideas, memories, and psychic states, and develops an abstract visual language to hold them. Drawing on eroticism, animism, and religious mythology, her work moves between figuration and abstraction, conjuring divine and earthly forms that emerge and then dissolve into vibrant fields of chromatic paint.

Murphy-Torres, by contrast, starts with the tactile experience of paint. He builds from material and formal concerns and slowly works towards moments of representational imagery. A single picture may change its subject multiple times during its creation, all in service of a search for resonant form. He works from art historical sources and from memory, but his paintings eventually take on a motif from his lived experience.

Though markedly different in terms of visual effect, these dual processes speak to a shared set of values: both Maceda and Murphy-Torres make work deeply rooted in their belief that painterly material can be transformed to hold an equivalence of lived experience.

Liam Murphy-Torres is currently an MFA student at the New York Studio School. He is the recipient of an Elizabeth Greenshields Foundation grant and his work has been exhibited in New York, London, Philadelphia, and Berlin. He earned his BFA from the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, where he was honored with the Packard Drawing Prize, the Irma H. Cook Prize, the August Cook Prize, and the Daniel Garber Prize for Excellence in Drawing. He holds a Barnes-DeMazia Certificate in art history and aesthetics, and has studied at the Art Students League of New York and the Mount Gretna School of Art.

Alex Maceda is a Filipina-American artist and writer and a current MFA student at the New York Studio School. Her work has been the subject of solo presentations at Herron House, Yucca Valley, CA (2024); Dorado 806 Projects, Los Angeles (2024); Upper Market Gallery, San Francisco (2024); and 29 Palms Art Gallery, Twentynine Palms, CA (2023). Recently, Maceda has participated in group exhibition at Harper’s, New York (2026), Ryan Hastings Gallery, Brooklyn (2025); College of the Desert, Palm Springs, CA (2025); Future Fair, New York (2025); High Line Nine Galleries, New York (2023); and Galeria Azur, Miami (2023). She holds a BA in Classical Studies from Dartmouth College and an MBA from Stanford Graduate School of Business.

If you’re new here, 13 things is a monthly (well, at least aspirationally monthly) newsletter of studio updates, creative inspiration — things I’m reading, seeing, watching, short reflections that may-or-may-not make their way to full essays, memes and more.

With intention of seeing you again December 13th — if not sooner! :)

Amac

13 Things - November 2025:

1 — Hello from New York (Studio School)

Hello from my second year in New York and the final year of my MFA at New York Studio School (NYSS). Terrifyingly, I graduate in 6 months and 1 day — which, well, fuck. How did that happen? As a second year, I have a much larger studio space: a dreamy room with a vaulted ceiling full of skylights that was, quite literally, one of the original galleries of the Whitney Museum of American Art, as our building was the first place to ever house it. How’s that for manifestation? My powers are growing. 😈

Reading between the lines, many of you caught that I didn’t love my first year at school. I joked in one of my first newsletters that if Joshua Tree was spirituality: beginner, New York is spirituality: advanced. I certainly feel that way about just living in the city, but I similarly feel that way about making art in these places. Working with art world people and showing in galleries in general is testing, but being in art school and working within the specific pedagogy of NYSS, now that has really rattled me to my core. I questioned if I had made the right decision, never on New York, but on going back to art school in general and to my school specifically. I knew if I made it through my first year — which was a BIG if — I would finish my second and graduate. A couple months into my last year and I am so happy that I stuck it out. I have all new instructors this year, many new schoolmates, and have built a deep mutual respect for and appreciation of the schoolmates I didn’t see eye-to-eye, or heart-to-heart, with last year. It’s like I am at a different institution, one where I feel challenged in the way that can only happen when one feels seen — when one’s work is really being engaged with — and it has truly been a joy.

2 — Some Thoughts Hanging on the Studio Wall

With my new instructors and classes have come richer conversations, and in turn, deeper reflections. Some recent thoughts and reminders currently hanging on my studio wall —

the interpretation of an [object, person, moment, feeling] becomes beautiful via the language of it’s interpretation

surface is a language — and an idea — that can dominate and hide fundamental formal (or conceptual) problems — move with care

“we have this quality of expansion and contraction inside ourselves — this dynamic is possibly more interesting than foreground, middleground, background” (Jilaine Jones)

if you do not have color or light — the edges become more critical — the exact angle of how things come together gives you a read of depth

does the gesture of the outer form relate enough to the inner workings? can the outer form be involved with what’s going on inside?

which sacred cows are calling to be tipped?

THE ACTIVITY OF CONTAINMENT

3 — Feed Cleanse, Here’s Minion

Minion is being a very sweet girl lately — originally a city gal, she is loving being in SoHo (lots of coffee shops with dog treats), on the fence about going to art openings (too much walking in between, sometimes gets stepped on) and about to turn 7 which makes her (sob!!!!) a senior dog!

4 — “Systems need to ritualize their own disruption and renewal or they rot from within.”

I’ve been thinking a lot about Trickster energy — the archetype that shakes things up, creates chaos, and is an agent for chance and change. I am rarely a podcast girlie, but “Trickster Jumps Sides (Re-issued for Tricky Times)” was recommended to me by my friend Jason Tan after clowns (a modern day trickster) kept coming up this spring.

“Systems need to ritualize their own disruption and renewal or they rot from within.” While change is a constant, change that is self-imposed and ritualized is more unique and currently top of mind both in my life and especially in my art practice. This podcast traces The Trickster across multiple cultures and mythologies and explores what it means for our modern day.

Listen Here

5 — Dreams come true… someone finally asked me about my skincare routine! 😂

I really felt as if I made it when one of the only beauty influencers I follow, Kristina Rodulfo of Pearl, a newsletter decoding beauty — particularly Filipina beauty — through the lens of culture, interviewed me for a profile this summer. We spoke about my art, my experience as a morena (or dark-skinned) Filipina, how much that influences the skin tones I choose for my figures (surprise — a lot), competing beauty standards, keeping the creative spark alive, my skincare routine (!!) and more. A short excerpt and link to the interview below:

KR: A lot of the figures you create have tan skin – is that intentional?

AM: Skin tone is probably the thing I think about the most in art. In undergrad, I basically only did self-portraiture and female figures, and then I dropped it for a really long time because I couldn’t mix a skin tone that felt realistic to me. I couldn’t find my own skin tone. It wasn’t until I found a color mix that felt good that I brought the figure back into my paintings. If you look back at my paintings, the figure is very, very dark: A specific shade of brown and tan or blue or something that’s completely unrealistic to skin tone. I would take painting classes in a more “classic” palette. The flesh tones they have you mix are very white, so they’re like peach undertones. They’re kind of pink – and I’m not pink. I was so tan because I was living in the desert and I realized, actually, my skin tone is kind of red. I think it’s interesting because as an Asian person, people always say Asians are “yellow.” So, I was quite literally trying to mix a skin tone based on an ochre color. I had this moment where I was like, no, it has to be a rusty red. And it opened up this whole color palette to me, and I brought the figure back into my work.

Read my Pearl Interview Here

6 — Save your Flowers for Yourself 💐

As someone who has been conditioned to perform and succeed, I’ve had to actively de-program myself from doing things just to prove I can do them. This has come across my feed a few times — let me know if that resonates?

7 — “Climbing my Mountain (On the False Promises of Timelines)”

It’s been almost two years since I went on any sort of retreat — no formal yoga or meditation retreats and no ayahuasca or other plant medicine ceremonies. There’s a Ram Dass saying that goes: “once you’ve got the message, hang up the phone.” I hung up the proverbial phone in January 2024, when I did my last silent meditation retreat and sat in my last ayahuasca ceremonies. I was fresh off the end of a 3-year relationship and at the beginning of what became the craziest and most fast-paced year of my life. I had the deep sense that after 4 years of near constant retreats and spiritual work, I was “done” for awhile. I needed a long integration period and for life to catch up.

Nearly two years later, I find myself considering going back to that same meditation retreat — I read (my own lol) reflection on the time and was humbled to see that two years later, both my fear and I suppose my wisdom, still hold:

Despite my free-spirited nature, the fearlessness to which I abandoned my former life and started over at 31, my desperate clinging to freedom and dreaming and finding what is true and real instead of what is expected — underneath it all is a desperate clinging to a timeline and all that it represents.

Underneath all that, still, is a fear that I have fallen behind — that I will never catch up, that what is for me has missed me.

In a world of uncertainty timelines gave me some semblance of control. Of sequencing. Rationality. Of this will happen, then this, then this. Of things working out ‘as planned.’ A thread I could hold onto (for dear life) in the gaping abyss of the future. But none of this is real; nothing is promised, all of this imagined — yet to happen, perhaps never happening, a sweet trick of self-deception to give myself momentary comfort. What plan? There is no plan. There was never a plan.

“Moha, or delusion, is one of the Buddha’s three poisons,” said my teacher. “All of this: timelines, expectations, where you should be and what you expect of people, all of this in many ways, lives in the realm of delusion. This is coming off as harsh, but I mean this in the most loving way: you are dealing with your own self-deception.”

8 — Art school should require basic business education. It’s crazy how much resistance there is to this!!

End of thought (for now!!)

9 — Eating with my eyes 👁️🫦👁️

I sometimes think I can taste colors, I can certainly feel them. I have such a visceral reaction to them when I see them; certain combinations feel orgasmic, I can feel my body clench and tingle when I witness them.

There is this saying “eat with your eyes” as opposed to eating with your mouth, but I think the two might be connected to me. I sometimes wonder if I actually dislike a food, or I just dislike how it looks, e.g., cauliflower — color, just horrendous. Broccoli, objectively good. When I cook for myself, I think of balancing color and texture more than anything else.

As we’ve now entered soup season, I find myself remembering the most amazing soup at Les Enfants Perdus in Paris this past summer. In truth, it actually needed a pinch of salt but when I think about it, I mostly recall the beautiful shades of green and the perfectly complimentary colors of the charred popcorn and the accompanying aperol spritz… in my mind’s eye it tasted perfect!

10 - Long live the Alexander McQueen Skull Scarf (2013) and the other Bestsellers from Net-A-Porter’s past 25 years

Net-a-porter, one of the original luxury online retailers, recently turned 25 and published a walk-down-memory-lane article featuring the most iconic and/or wanted items, by year, from it’s first quarter century. From Loewe’s Puzzle bag (2025) to DVF’s Wrap Dress (2002), this is an extremely fun read for any current or former-fashion girlies.

P.S. I originally found this article Laura Reilly’s Substack, Magasin, which fantastic chic-girl-with-a-brain shopping, fashion, and culture newsletter.

Net-a-porter's Bestsellers

11 - NYC: “It’s Time” at Ryan Hastings Gallery through 12/3

My painting, ‘turning towards’ is currently on view at “It’s Time,” a group show at Ryan Hastings Gallery in Greenpoint, Brooklyn through December 3. Gallery is open most weekends and by appointment.

For inquiries or to see the show, please reach out to Dakota Hunt at dakota@ryanhastingsgallery.com or reply to this e-mail.

12 - Save The Date

For the first time in two years, I don’t have a tight show deadline and my work has been all the better for it. Looking forward, please save the date for two exciting shows:

• Friday, February 20 — opening reception for a duo show with Liam Murphy-Torres at NYSS

• Thursday, May 14 — opening reception for MFA thesis show, the culmination of my Master’s program, also at NYSS

13 - They’ve Always Feared a Woman’s Mouth (Kali)

As always, ending with a painting — this is part of a series of smaller paintings inspired by religious icons and imagined as “paintings you pray to” — work that sits on an altar and reveals itself to you over time.

“they’ve always feared a woman’s mouth (kali)” oil on canvas, 9” x 12”, 2025.

If you’ve been here awhile, you know I’ve gone in and out of writing consistently, and that I start almost every year on here by saying that I’m (shocker) going to write more consistently. So here’s my newest attempt, lightly inspired by my friend Brian Madden’s fantastic (and consistent…) newsletter First Fridays — I give you 13 Things my monthly newsletter chronicling my pitter patters, notes, feelings, and intrusive thoughts, i.e. all things in and out of the studio, the goings on of my mind! The list will come out on the 13th and always start with a recent art thing and end with a new painting, but the messy middle… who knows what you’ll get in there. 😜

I think this will be good!

I think this will be fun!

I’ll still be writing longer-form essays and sending out updates on new work but I hope this will be a more expansive and light-hearted space for a variety of interests. Let me know what you think in the comments or if private is more your thing, reply to me via the e-mail.

xo Amac

13 Things, June 2025:

1 — Recent Art Thing: Future Fair (I’m Famous Now)

In May, I participated in my first art fair, Future Fair at Chelsea Industrial in NYC. I was part of the Visionary Projects booth, alongside glass blower Austin Fields and mixed-media artist Amelia Briggs. The curation was fantastic (see above) and the work was very well received, with half of my paintings selling on VIP day alone (mentioned in press coverage in The Observer - I’m famous now, try to keep up). Haylee and Blayne at Visionary Projects were the first curators to ever show my work in New York, back in December 2023 at The Highline Nine Galleries. It felt very poetic to have them be the first gallery to show me at an art fair and for the art fair to open the same day as my final day of my school year. The fact that it is called Visionary Projects and Future Fair wasn’t lost on me either. It’s all feeling very aligned. ✨ A few paintings are still available, including the large one on the left, so if you’re interested, please reach out!

2 — Currently on the bedside table: Great Black Hope by Rob Franklin

I am super excited to read Rob Franklin’s debut novel, Great Black Hope, which was published this week. Both Stanford alums, Rob and I were introduced by a mutual bestie in 2017 when we were both living in Berlin — me, in between years at business school contemplating what a more creative life would look like and him, recently out of Bain New York and working on a novel idea. Fast-forward to today, and it is moving to realize we are both doing what we hoped all those years ago. 🥲

Great Black Hope follows a recent, Black, queer, Stanford graduate, “caught between worlds of race and class, glamour and tragedy, a friend’s mysterious death and his own arrest, from an electrifying new voice.”

Buy it from your local bookstore or here to fund Katy Perry going back to space.

3 — Begrudgingly I Finally Downloaded ChatGPT but

I will literally un-alive myself if one more dude tells me they’re want to disrupt therapy with AI.

Just kidding, I won’t, but this has legitimately happened to me like 3 times already this calendar year, twice on a first date. Can we please stop trying to automate human connection?!

4 — I’m Sorry for What I Said When I Was Cold

This was my first east coast winter in a decade and I did not handle it well. But all is forgiven/forgotten now that it’s spring/summer. My feelings summed up, exactly:

5 — “Confessions of a Micro-Influencer”

I’ve had the beginnings of an essay with this title in my drafts folder since 2023, when I realized I had crossed that invisible line where your online followers are more people you don’t know personally than people you do.

I recently broke 5K on Instagram, which is small by social media standards, but big enough that strangers have started coming up to me at my shows because they’ve been following me for awhile or stopping me at art openings.

Presumably this is what I’ve wanted, but it is very strange to find yourself on one side of a parasocial relationship; there is an inherent mismatch in access to personal information between me and many of my followers. They see me, read my content, engage with my art, or watch my process, and I often see nothing about them. I am not talking about other artists, aspiring or established, or even passive readers like some of you, but about the people that are often hidden behind private profiles who will interact with me with familiarity, consistently liking and replying to my stories, despite my not knowing or being able to see anything about them.

I used to post a lot more about my day-to-day life. Then, one weekend, when I didn’t post (I was camping), I had multiple strangers from accounts I didn’t know DM me to see if I was ok. This was sweet I suppose, as it is flattering I suppose to have people invested in you, but honestly it was more rattling — I realized some people were watching me so closely that they noticed a 2 day gap in posting and felt the need to reach out. A couple of these people were men and it got very uncomfortable very quickly. Being known, and in the public eye, is a double-edged sword for sure and one that I have had to keep a very close watch on.

For the most part, this is more a blessing than a problem, but over the past few years I have experienced the rare and in one case, very scary, problem. One account that was watching closely became a local stalker in Joshua Tree, and the situation got bad enough that I sought (and failed to get) police intervention.

I’ve spent a lot of the past couple years rethinking how and what I share online and what it means to be online, increasing or decreasing my personal posts, deciding when and if I share. I was recently asked what my relationship to fame was and I’m been reflecting on it more deeply. I don’t know if a full essay on this topic will ever come to fruition, so here’s the seed of the experience anyway. If you’re in the same boat, I’d love to hear your thoughts.

5 — Feed Cleanse 🪄🪄🪄 Inspiring Quote ~

“[T]hat which we call destiny goes forth from within people, not from without into them.”

Rainier Maria Rilke, Letters to a Young Poet, Letter 8

One of my favorite quotes from one of my favorite writers from one of my favorite books — I think of it often and for months it was on a post-it note on my mirror in Joshua Tree… this idea that destiny is not something we search for and find out in the world, but something that we gradually uncover within ourselves through deep listening and courageous work.

This year I read an epistolary project modeled after this, Letters to a Young Painter by Rosemarie Beck, one of the founding artist of New York Studio School. It is also a fantastic and quick read, particularly great for artists!

7 — Over My (Millennial, Emo-kid) Head

If you, like me, were a child of The OC Soundtrack and the indie rock of the aughts that surrounded it, you have likely noticed that in the past ~year many of our favorite bands are doing (😭 SOB 😭) 20 YEAR (😭 C R I E S H A R D E R 😭) tours of their iconic albums. I am simultaneously mortified and of course, desperate to get tickets.

The two currently on my radar:

“The Resurrection of Rilo Kiley” — less an album tour and more a reunion tour by possibly my favorite band of all-time — and the NYT article to go with it for good measure. Intrusive music thought: many of Sabrina Carpenter’s less popular tracks really give old Jenny Lewis, particularly Slim Pickins'.

The Fray — ‘How to Save A Life’ 20th Anniversary Tour — fun fact, one of the only and the first times I ever blacked out was from drinking margaritas at this tour in high school (sorry Mom). I literally blacked in for the last song, “Over My Head (Cable Car).” Like I said, iconic.

8 — In Which I Continue to Kick Millennials When We’re Down

I think most of you, like me, are millennials so some additional little funnies for you —

I went to drinks with my friend and his 20-something sister and she was wearing a “vintage” Abercrombie top, as in the spaghetti strap one with the lace around the top and the bottom. VINTAGE. Like the ones we wore in high school. 😭 Tbh it looked way better on her than it ever did on me, but in that moment, I saw my mortality flash before my eyes.

There was a Limited Too pop-up recently in New York. I overheard a teenager saying it’s what her mom used to wear…

One of my dear MFA friends, who is 25, told me and my other friend, who is 40, that he had never even heard of The O.C. He had also never seen the greatest Disney franchise of all time, The Mighty Ducks. I told him never to say something like that to me ever again. 😂

I end like all of my texts with emojis which I guess is super millennial fml (see what I did there).

To balance this all out, one of my classmates guessed that I was 28 and seemed legitimately shocked to hear I was 36, so I think we can count that as a win.

9 — NYC Show to See: Sarah D’Ambrosio at MARCH Gallery

High-brow — last night I met a friend at Sarah D’Ambrosio’s solo show, Brooklyn, Berlin at MARCH gallery. It was my first time at MARCH and it’s a beautiful, spacious but not overwhelming, light-filled gallery right on the edge of the East Village. I wasn’t familiar with Sarah’s work but I was truly taken by her paintings — striking, figurative works in the modernist tradition, mostly of males in water-based scenes, exploring varying states of freedom.

For my painting nerds, these days I rarely see phthalo blue turquoise used in general, let alone in an elegant way and/or as a central color to a body of work. It is one of my favorite colors but it is extremely overpowering but was used masterfully in Sarah’s show.

For my normies, galleries are free and you can walk-in anytime during opening hours. The attendants will often be quiet, but you should feel free to ask them to tell you about the show. More likely than not, if it’s not busy, they’ll give you a private tour. :)

Sarah’s show runs until July 25th at MARCH, 62-64 Avenue A, NYC.

10 — Why Did I Decide to Get an MFA if I had Already Started Showing in Galleries?

This is the question I get most frequently, both from artists and friends who don’t know much about the arts. I recorded and shared my answer via video on Instagram, which you can watch here. I also shared how I cobbled together a non-MFA-MFA before I decided to get my full-time MFA here.

This is the first time I’ve spoken to the camera in awhile, which was very anxiety-inducing! I don’t really know what I’m going to use ChatGPT for but I decided to start by feeding it my one-off thoughts, as if it was my private Twitter (RIP) feed and it had this to say, which was actually quite sweet for a robot.

11 — Product Recommendation You Didn’t Ask For

If you’re not already using them, the Dieux reusable eye masks (+Auracle eye gel) really work and are easy and mess-free to use. These are for everyone! Guys you should be using them too! Dieux’s co-founder is also a Filipina!

I am no beauty influencer, but I use these everyday and did just get called 28 so I think you should trust me.

12 — “The Truth About Dreams” — NYU Tisch 2025 Commencement Speech by Maggie Rogers

Singer-songwriter Maggie Rogers recently gave an inspiring speech about dreaming and art as a vocation to the NYU Tisch graduating class of 2025. It’s only 14m and absolutely worth a watch or you can read an adapted version published in the New York Times as an Op-Ed. From the speech:

13 — ‘Embrace’ — New Painting

‘embrace’

colored pencil, oil, and beeswax on canvas

16” x 20”

Brooklyn, NY

I recently moved my studio to Greenpoint for a couple months and this was one of the first finished paintings coming out of the new space. I wouldn’t say no to a little bit of cash over the summer, so I’m immediately making this work available — please reply with inquiries or to see all available work!

💓💓💓 You made it down here! I think it was fun!? I had fun. I think I’ll do it again. Sorry about the typos, wrote this on the plane. Probably miscounted. Didn’t check. Good enough. Lmk what you think. Til next time 💓💓💓

Good morning!

Delighted to share that I am participating in my first art fair, Future Fair in NYC, this week with Visionary Projects, a gallery based in the Lower East Side.

The fair runs through this Saturday 5/10 and we are presenting a body of work of 9 new paintings. There has been a great response; 4 paintings were sold during the VIP preview on Wednesday. If you’d like to see the collector preview, please reply to this e-mail and I’d be happy to send it!

My work is being shown with Austin Fields and Amelia Briggs, installation photos below. If you’re in NYC, I’ll be at the fair today (Friday) around 6p and all day tomorrow (Saturday). You can buy tickets below and discounted tickets are available for artists and educators onsite.

Future Fair Tickets

There aren’t many obvious “promotion” points in a visual arts career, but if there were, participating in your first fair would be one of them. I am incredibly excited and grateful to everyone who has already seen the work.

More soon and love from rainy NYC,

Amac

Happy Spring!

How is everyone doing? It seems that every week we are hit by — yet another set of — unprecedented times. In the midst of all this, I find myself clinging, more solidly, to the tiny beautiful things.

I’m reminded of this passage in the book of the same name, Tiny Beautiful Things, by Cheryl Strayed:

I have always been interior-world-oriented, for better or for worse. As within, so without, as they say. I cannot help but wonder how — if at all — the external reality of our rights being taken away mirrors our own internal reality (collectively, individually).

In what ways have we stopped believing we have the right to hope, to love, to expand, to have and enjoy both the large and tiny beautiful things? In what ways can we allow ourselves those joys? In what ways can that allowance ripple out to create positive change in a negative world?

New Collection on Tacit

The past few weeks I have found myself walking, with the ease that comes with warmer weather, along the sidewalks of NYC. Tulips are sprouting in every box and on every sidewalk. Parklets are going back up and couples, old and new, are chatting over glasses of chilled wine. The world feels like it is waking up. There is so much joy, despite everything. Things are finally blooming.

A few weeks ago, I heard Mary Gabriel speak at New York Studio School, on the females of the Abstract Expressionist movement, who worked the similarly unprecedented times of World War II. At the end she asked (paraphrased):

What is the artist’s role when the world is burning?

How do you justify making your art when people are dying?

Painting when you could be protesting?

You have to believe the role of the artist is to capture the collective’s conscience, the reaction of its spirit.

I truly believe art sustains us — that is brings us hope, that it exists as a vehicle for connection both between ourselves and with a larger spirit. On the surface a painting might just be a tiny beautiful thing, but it represents so much more: the beauty that is our birthright, our essence, and our service. I aim to capture that which I think can never not exist, even amidst a burning world.

In that spirit, I am delighted to share 6 new works via Tacit Collective, an online art gallery and art consultancy dedicated to women artists. I was so excited when Tacit’s founder, Nuria Madrenas, reached out to me last fall to work on a collection with them. Based in Canada, Tacit has a lovely curation of emerging female artists from around the world — I encourage you to take a look!

My Tacit works were mostly painted this past January, in the dead of winter, with a eye towards and a hope for the brightness of spring. They feature a more high-chroma palette than my previous work and dive into one of my favorite motifs — the vessel.

For the first time I’ve also made pages from my sketchbook available. Filled with my personal notes, thumbnails, and ideas for paintings, these are a more affordable ($300) and more intimate collectors’ items that can be ordered in a beautiful shadowbox frame for your home.

All of these works can be collected directly via Tacit — you can view my collection here. I’m looking forward to sharing more soon. :) And as always, if you have any questions or just want to say hi, don’t hesitate to reply to this e-mail.

Alex Maceda - Tacit Collection

All my love and with the audacity of a spring bloom,

A

Hi everyone — I trust you are thawing out from what was an absolutely brutal winter across the board. I’ve been in full cocoon mode since December but slowly coming up for air and excited for a long summer starting early May when school gets out.

I have some very exciting shows in NYC this spring. On April 4th, I’ll be making my curatorial debut with THE FEMALE GAZE, details below. This is a unique show where I’ll be sharing paintings done for school work that would have likely not seen the light of day otherwise, including a still life, a male nude, and maybe even erotic drawings done from life. I’m joined by two classmates who have become dear friends, AJ Lim and Holly Overton. Raging in age from 40 to 36, the three of us share the unique perspective of being mid-career females and all that comes with it. If you’re in NYC, I hope to see you at the reception on the 4th!

More news to come soon… but in the meantime I suggest you buy early bird tickets to Future Fair, May 7-10. 😘

THE FEMALE GAZE 👁️

April 4-17, 2025

AJ LIM, ALEX MACEDA and HOLLY OVERTON // Curated by Alex Maceda

New York Studio School Student Gallery, 8 W8th Street, NYC

Opening reception with the artists on Friday, April 4 from 6:30-8:30pm.

Please join us for THE FEMALE GAZE, a group exhibition featuring female-identifying artists AJ Lim (NYSS MFA ‘26), Alex Maceda (NYSS MFA ‘26), Holly Overton (NYSS MFA ‘26). Via their paintings and drawings, the artists explore and challenge traditional art historical – often cis-male – perspectives and tropes, from desire and the nude, to strength via work and the use of the hands. Drawn primarily from personal experiences, the work examines power dynamics – artist and model, viewer and subject, female and male – and questions what it means to reinforce, subvert, and ultimately define ‘the female gaze.’

Proceeds go to benefit Grief x Hope and closing price will include insured, domestic shipping. You can bid via the comments on Instagram. If you don’t have Instagram or would like to bid anonymously, reply to this e-mail and I can bid for you.

There are many amazing works by other artists up for auction — you can view them here and I’ve included some favorites below. This is a great way to support living artists, get a piece for under the retail price, and do some good along the way.

More soon xo

‘figure study’ — current bid $400 (retail $800)

bid for figure study here

‘hands of fate’ — current bid $600 (retail $900)

bid for hands of fate here

favorites from other lobster club live auctions

erin lynn welsh - 'AF6'

kristen giorgi - 'healing waters'

b.madden - 'six months in dogpatch 002'

philip patton - 'fancy vase'

I hope this note finds you and your loved ones safe. Like many of us, I’ve been totally devastated to watch the destruction of the LA fires in my beloved home state of California. I made Southern California my home for the past ~4 years and Los Angeles was very much the extended community of my high desert home in Joshua Tree. My heart breaks for my many friends and the strangers who have lost everything in the span of a few short days.

I’m participating in Lobster Club’s fundraiser for artists impacted by the LA fires. All proceeds will go to Grief x Hope to benefit impacted artists. I’ll be auctioning off two paintings — to bid, please comment your bid on the Instagram post for each, linked below. The current highest bidder will be pinned to the top of the comments and the bidding will end Thursday, January 16 at 9pm EST. Domestic shipping included in final price.

bid for 'figure study' here

bid for 'hands of fate' here

new and available work

I’m on winter break and have finally had a minute to update my available work. You can view it here:

Available Work

Through the end of the month (Jan 31), I’ll be donating 20% of my proceeds from all sales to the same LA artist fund.

If you are interested in a piece, please reach out by replying to this e-mail. If you love something but can’t make the price work, please reach out and I’ll do what I can to work with you. If you’re interested and would like the funds donated to a different LA fundraiser or Go Fund Me, I happy to do that too.

2025 exhibitions

I’ve gotten a lot of requests about new work. 💓 For now, I can share that I’ll be releasing a small collection with Tacit Collective in February and will be working on my next show with Herron House the second half of the year. I’ll also be curating and participating in a group show at New York Studio School in April.

If you’re interested in working together this year, I’d love to hear from you. I’m particularly excited to work with galleries led by women and/or people of color and for summer group show opportunities, especially in New York City. That all being said, I’ll be taking a much lighter exhibition schedule this year to focus on my MFA.

More soon. Stay safe. Lots of love and many blessings. 🌙

I’ve been waiting to send out these paintings — Election Day in the US might be a weird day, or it might be the most appropriate. These are paintings about reproductive freedom, something I hope you are all voting for today.

A friend told me these feel like the most explicitly sexual paintings I’ve ever made. They can certainly be read that way. My hope, always, is that you imbue my work with your own meaning and significance based on what resonates for you.

Meaning is created the moment an object touches your mental conception of it. I’ve always envisioned it as this third independent thing, sitting in the space between the object and your consciousness, co-created, floating. A little cloud taking form in the space between. Similar to pulling a Tarot Card, reading a horoscope, etc., and getting value from that — in my belief, the proverbial card itself holds no inherent meaning. The meaning is activated upon witnessing and the receiver and their personal experience, biases, and projections, is an inherent part of that meaning-making process. The Magician card holds a symbol, but that symbol is only activated when [You] interact with it and associate it with your own life.

From this vantage (“an object has no inherent meaning”), we might be tempted to throw out the artist’s intention. Quite the contrary — similar to the viewer, the artist creates meaning with the work via the process of creation. Similar to the little cloud, I’ve always envisioned this more like a romantic fog that sits around the piece permanently. It’s separate but it’s always there, and it’s hard (but possible) to truly see the piece without it. The artist’s intention is always valid, always biased, and likely inescapable. At the most it’s desperately important; at the least it’s simply interesting dinnertime fodder.

So let me tell you about these paintings.

One is a self-portrait (see image at end of newsletter), my first painted in New York City. It references The Magician card in Tarot, sometimes called The Alchemist, which is a card I was pulling often at the end of the summer. In the card, the figure holds one hand to the sky and one to the heavens, representing a connection between the spiritual and reality. A conduit, a grounding force. This was hopeful as best, as I finally learned what it meant to feel “disassociated” in my first few weeks here. Extremely ungrounded, disoriented, and neither here nor there.

Two of the paintings explicitly reference female genitalia and/or penetration and were actually inspired not by sex, but by my recent experience with egg freezing, a process I had the privilege of going through and one that I fear will be lost if today’s election goes a certain way.

In my first month or so here, penetration was very much on my mind — and not in the fun way. If everything in the desert is vast and expansive, everything in New York is vertical and compressed. Buildings pushing upwards, streets being squeezed in. The energy is extremely masculine, fast, and intense. Everyone is pushing against you, bumping into you on the subway; everything is loud, all the time. With egg freezing, I literally getting penetrated multiple times a day by needles, having my blood drawn, getting ultrasounds which required a machine up my vaginal cavity every other day. Penetrated — and not in the fun way. It was not the most comfortable.

If the desert invites you to open up, New York invites you to define your boundaries. With everyone pushing up against you, you are forced to say, “this is me, this is you,” lest you be consumed by the rush. But the rush is a thrill as well; I think the rush might be holy. The rush pulls you into a mass of energy that allows you to lose yourself. I felt similarly in the desert, where the expanse exposed me to the point where it felt my boundaries were washed away by the wind. On the surface, this experience of being consumed by nature seems the opposite of being consumed by the rush of a city. In reality, the diametric opposition is so extreme that you find yourself falling over the edge and back on the other side. That existence, those masses of energy, start to feel the same.

I think a lot about it all being holy. I think it is all holy.

The second painting, “on the border of sacred mystery and indecency” find its title from Simon Shama’s writing on Bernini’s “The Ecstasy of Saint Teresa,” a famous Baroque sculpture, in which the Saint is depicted in religious, orgasmic ecstasy.

Where is the border between sacred mystery and indecency? Does it exist? Is it obscured by a romantic fog? I think I’d like to live there. Neither here nor there. Both, and. The border of sacred mystery and indecency… I’m starting to think I do live there. I think it is all holy. I think I need to believe that it — that this — is all holy in order to survive.

Reminds me of one of my favorite memes:

I used to say New York is the city in the world I feel the most comfortable — it still is, I think, but for my art practice it has been a huge adjustment. I painted these works in my first couple weeks, tapping into energy that felt held over from the place before. Now that I’ve settled into New York City, a couple months in, it hasn’t felt quite authentic to paint feminine forms nor paint in the same palette, which so explicitly references outside light. For the first time in my practice, I’m painting interiors. Warmer light. Compositions with primarily straight lines. Architecture. Hell hath frozen over and last week, I willingly painted a male nude. What is happening!

I knew my practice would change, but the amount it has in such a short time is disorienting. I’m working through it. It feels scary, honestly. I feel resistance to it and to the vast amount of input and prescriptive instruction I’ve been getting at school. I am trying to trust the process, but I sometimes fear The Magic is lost. I’m waiting to pull The Magician card again, if only to be reminded that we cannot ever really lose The Magic.

I keep coming back to the idea — it is all holy. It is all holy, right? It has to be. How else do we survive?

These three paintings are available directly from me, out of the studio. If you’re interested or have any questions, please reach out, I’d love to hear from you.

My primary income while in school is the sale of my paintings, so I am indebted to you and your support of my practice! Thank you for being here. More soon.

Hello friends — it’s been awhile! It’s been a whirlwind of a year and I find myself writing you from New York City, my new home as of a month ago. I know, big change. A LOT has happened. More on this later…

For now, I’m delighted to share 18 new paintings and the artist statement from my recent solo show, “The Desert Will Hold You,” presented by The Graham Collective at The Graham Residence in Yucca Valley, California.

This has been my most ambitious show yet and it has been incredibly well-received — already one third sold. I am so grateful for your support. To view available work you can visit the below link, or reach out to Lindsey at lindsey@graham-collective.com.

Explore The Paintings

Over the coming weeks, I’ll dive into more on the past few months and the creation of this body of work, how I ended up in NYC, other updates from the studio and the like. A few short ones at the end of this newsletter.

More soon and sending love, always.

Amac

The Desert Will Hold You

Alex Maceda Solo Show, The Graham Collective, Fall 2024

Artist Statement: “The Desert is normally depicted as harsh, aggressive, and expansive. And it is all those things – but in my experience it is also soft, welcoming, and self-contained. The Desert is as much crucible as it is cocoon: a place to be forged and a place to be held.

For the past four years, I’ve made my home in The Desert, a place I never expected to live, but that called me nonetheless. I’ve immersed myself in her contradictions: harsh yet soft, expansive yet small, still yet dynamic, barren yet fertile, washed out and yet so full of color. I’ve explored her exterior landscapes in parallel to diving into my own interior ones. My experiences scrambling on boulders and walking across her vast expanse have felt dreamlike in their quality. On many evenings I witness sunset and moonrise at the same moment, soft pink gradients melting into blue on one side and warm tans on the other.

In a world where everything moves so quickly, when endings come as rapidly as beginnings, The Desert has offered me stillness. Time slows down here and moments you want to savor seem to last a bit longer, allowing you to savor them even more slowly. There is a sensuality and richness to this place. It wraps itself around you, in a way. It holds you.

This feeling of being held by someone – or something – greater is at the core of this body of work, and one of the things that most struck me about staying at The Graham Residence. The approach to the home is a one-lane, bumpy, winding dirt road. You snake around boulders and hug their curves. As you drive, houses get more and more spaced out until they all but completely fall away. The residence itself sits tucked away with geologic forms on every side, visible from its many glass windows. It feels hermetic: like an escape, like a cocoon. The surrounding rocks and valleys become a literal barrier between you and normal life. It’s a contradictory experience of being held in one place, completely still, while still witnessing the passing of time via sun rising and setting over the mountainous horizon, the stars passing over you in the night sky

I paint from life – my experience of it – but when I first concepted this show I had imagined a story about a lovers’ weekend at The Graham Residence. Something that never happened. Stolen time and stolen intimacy. What if you weren’t supposed to be with someone – how would you steal away and where would you go? What if you had finally found someone but knew you had to leave – where might you spend your last weekend? Where would you go when you want to savor a moment slowly, when you wanted or needed time to stop? I thought it might be a house like this.

I found myself really fascinated by the intimacy between new lovers: first smile, first kiss, first skin contact. The moment when everything is pure potential, the moment before you become able to hurt each other. It’s a beautiful moment, so fleeting and yet stretching out into forever. So real and yet not real at all; it’s a time when you are more an idea to each other than anything of substance. Dreamlike, imaginary.

Pairs of figures and anthropomorphic landscapes move in, out of and across these compositions. Hands reach for balls of light representing what we most desire, whatever that may be. Full moons and suns appear in the same image, indicating a passing of time. These figures can be read as much as lovers reaching for each other as an individual reaching for the divine – reaching, consciously or unconsciously, towards a fate she is pulled to. Space is depicted across the canvases and within their four edges; many hold interior spaces that pull the viewer in and deeper. While painting this show, I found out I’d be leaving The Desert, for school in The City. This show is my swan song, an ode of gratitude to a place that has given me so much and an invite to the viewer to consider what they might find if they come here too.”

— Alex Maceda, Joshua Tree, August 2024

View "The Desert Will Hold You"

Updates from the Studio:

• I recently moved to New York City (!) and started my MFA (!!) in Painting at the New York Studio School. Going to art school has been a lifelong dream and NYC has always had a special place in my heart, so while this has been a major and also somewhat unexpected transition, I couldn’t be more excited. More to share here in the coming weeks.

• Collect: My painting, “Hands of Fate,” was recently included in Visionary Projects’ Group Show “COOL OFF.” It is available to purchase here.

• NYC — Save the date, Thu 10/24: I’ll be part of the group show, “Be Right Back” with Gallery Index 8. It’s a fantastic group of artists, some of whom I’ve admired from afar for years, so I am incredibly excited to be included. Save the date for the opening on Thursday 10/24 from 6-9p. I’ll be in attendance!

• SF — I’m excited to be included in an upcoming group show at Strike Slip Gallery in December. Follow their Instagram for more updates.

• My essay, “The Desert Will Hold You,” was published in No Tokens Journal this summer and was recently nominated for a Best of Net Award for Non-Fiction.

There is a special kind of intimacy between new lovers, when you still sit in the medial space where everything is a possibility and the other person is still a perfect idea.

I often wonder if we ever truly interact with one another. I am interacting with my idea of you, you with your idea of me. As we spend more time those sketches get filled in, rewritten, reworked. Assumptions we make are proven true and proven false — we disappoint each other in one way and surprise each other in another.

Life settles in, so hard and so beautiful and so much more tactile than the throes of new love. Deep intimacy & true love, the kind that can only form over time and across experiences.

But there is a different kind of intimacy, I think no less important, when things are new. A special kind of thrill when you are first texting your crush and making them tell you a secret 🤫 the feeling of deep presence with a handsome stranger, each looking at the other and mutually deciding you both want know more.

It is beautiful chaos. The kind that can be addicting, the kind that is fun to lose yourself in… that specific kind of energy generated when you first get to know a person, before they become someone who can hurt you.

That is the thrust behind this painting, the smallest in the exhibition and the last one in FLIRT 🎀 to be named.

In my best relationships — romantic, platonic, otherwise… we’ve found a way to keep this energy present, to always find some newness, to tap into that thrill. The eroticism of surprise & intrigue. I want more of that for all of us, in all the ways. I call it in, and so it is.

This painting is available. Price includes tax and insured, US domestic shipping to purchase please reply to this e-mail or e-mail hi@alexmaceda.studio.

To view all available paintings from FLIRT, click here.

My solo show FLIRT closes this weekend in San Francisco. If you’re local, please join us for two closing events, details below. I hope to see you there!

Friday 4/19 at 7p: Red Light Lit presents FLIRT, a local author showcase. Complimentary wine will be served, no RSVP needed.

Saturday 4/20 at 5p: FLIRT closing reception at the gallery. Complimentary wine will be served, no RSVP needed.

Hi friends! So excited to announce my next solo show, FLIRT 🎀, opens in less than two weeks at Upper Market Gallery in San Francisco on Friday, April 5th.

This is my debut solo show in San Francisco and I am delighted to be showing work where I grew up for the first time.

There will be a collector preview on Friday, April 5th and an opening reception on Saturday, April 6th. You can find more details and RSVP for both here. More programming to be announced.

FLIRT 🎀 will include eight new, mid-to-large scale, oil and acrylic abstract paintings. A collector preview will go out this week and a newsletter preview will go out next week. Please see below for my artist statement on this body of work.

Huge thank you to Nora and Olivia at Upper Market for their support and this opportunity.

I hope to see you in San Francisco! xo Alex

on FLIRT 🎀

FLIRT explores feminine embodiment, specifically the flavor of it that feels ecstatic, joyful, free and dare I say, irresponsible. 

Unapologetic girlhood. Insisting on staying soft. Giggling at inappropriate times. The thrill of texting your crush - and making them tell you a secret. Hugging a random gal in a club bathroom because you're drunk and you like her outfit. Wearing the dress. Wearing the heels. Wearing the ribbon in your hair. Giving your life to your besties. Ordering the extra martini. Brightness and boldness. 

These are paintings that pull you in filled with brushstrokes that flirt with you. The combinations of colors go from tonal to daring; each painting invites a surprise, each painting invites you to first dance on the surface, then go deeper… but only if you feel intrigued. 

I sometimes think love is too serious a thing – life is too serious a thing. In a time when womanhood feels more and more under attack and at a time where my peers are going through everything from marriages to births to divorces, the idea of flirting feels lost and foreign, from a time too long ago. And that is why it feels important. 

To invite lightness, to invite joy, to sit in the medial space where everything is a possibility and everyone is still a perfect idea, feels amongst the boldest and the most revolutionary acts I, as a woman, can take. 

I want more joy for us. For a moment, I want to thrust responsibility aside, I want to forget the heaviness of the world. I want to flirt. 

— alex maceda, joshua tree, ca, march 2024

view available work

Good morning people! Where are we? How are we? How did we get here? I’m in a crazy stretch which will take me from New York to Joshua Tree to San Francisco to Los Angeles on 4 consecutive nights. Riding the highest high from my opening in LA last week and also some low personal lows. 🎢 It really be like that, huh? 🌊

This morning, I’m sharing one of the paintings, “existential kink” and an old writing piece called, “My Kink.” Saucy for a Sunday, I know.

I wrote the following piece sometime in 2021 and performed it at Red Light Literature in 2022. I forgot about it until recently, when I painted this painting. It’s one of the smaller paintings in the show but the title got a lot of notice during the opening. It is titled after the book of the same name, “Existential Kink” by Carolyn Elliott, phD. It is a must read — I share more about it after the piece.

Hope you enjoy. Take care of yourselves this week. Pay close attention to your shadows. xo

My Kink 

A few years back I read a book on Habit. The gist of it was, Habits are powerful and they are hard to break.

A couple years back I read a book on Psychedelics. It likened a trip to fresh snowfall on the mountain. Once it happens, any path is yours to choose. Prior to that, you’re likely going down the path of least resistance — hopefully, for your sake, that’s a good one. Likely not.

Lately my therapist has been calling my propensity to catastrophize, “my kink.” I thought kink was choking or a fucked up phrase in your ear, etc. — turns out it is. It’s all true. It is the disturbed emotional pleasure I seem to get from my inducing feelings of deeply distraught pain. 

It goes like this: I lie in bed and play over and over in my mind how he will hurt me; I dive into my phone and seek out the past loves, or the suspicious follows, follow the tunnels from post to like to profile and am certain — am absolutely certain — he must be saying exactly what he says to me, to her. Who is she?

I do this, lying in bed, right before sleeping, so that every nerve in my body is on high-alert, over-sensitive, waiting, yearning to be touched by the one like by a name I don’t recognize of a photo that is suggestive enough to catapult me over the edge until I melt into a pool of delicious, delicious pain. I do this before bed so I cannot sleep; let’s stay up all night, shall we?

Don’t tempt me, I will. 

As my fingers move I let them take off the last layer of self-certainty left on my body. I try to resist but it is half-hearted, my fingertip so slightly traces the screen to scroll and land on what will unleash a burst of all that I have waited to say, because I knew, I knew, and now I can know that everything he has told me was a lie — how intuitive I am, I get to say. How smart I am. How right I am. How justified I have been in holding back. 

I knew I couldn’t trust you.

I knew and that is why I shut my heart and looked at you with suspicion even as you worked to change for me, even as you lay your heart out for me, even as you let all the ways you cared seep out of the edges and betray your own kink-ridden heart, even as you told me and tried and showed me and kept trying even as you, with all your flaws, said maybe perhaps you didn’t know — I knew. I knew. I knew and I knew, I knew it. 

I am just waiting to say I knew it to you. I fantasize about saying it every night as I lie in bed, the tips of my fingers scrolling to find the exact spot where you will hurt me, moving down the path of least resistance.

It is hard to break.

On Existential Kink

At some point in the past few years, my therapist recommended, “Existential Kink” by Carolyn Elliot, which I find has become somewhat of a cult-classic amongst Millennial females. The recommendation came after she listened to me complain about (yet another) emotionally-unavailable partner. The main idea of the book is that the negative patterns we find ourselves in (unavailable partners, money problems, victimhood…) may unconsciously actually be pleasurable to us, i.e., kinky, in that they allow us not only to maintain a familiar behavior (pattern) but also to do so in an exciting way.

“Fear,” Elliot writes, “is just excitement without breath.” Fear is the other side of the coin to desire, she posits. Everything we fear, we desire in some way. Everything we desire, we fear. She spends quite a bit of time on love (of course) but also, very interestingly, on money.

On the former: many of us crave intimacy, or think we do, but also deeply fear it, consciously or unconsciously, because of how it exposes us. We say we want big love but are terrified of what a love that big might ask of us. We find ourselves constantly drawn to emotionally unavailable partners and think something is wrong with us, wonder why this is happening when we are “manifesting” love. But deep down, it is our fear that is making itself manifest. Perhaps our fear of love is so great, that we call in or find partners who cannot give it to us. So we don’t have to have it. So we have an out.

Elliot relies heavily on Jungian psychology (i.e. the psychology of the unconscious) which requires a lot of debatably blind belief on the users part, so if it feels like a stretch, that is legitimate. But it is also a legitimately interesting idea — that perhaps the “negative” things in our lives, especially the patterns that repeat, are actually us creating outs for ourselves, creating realities that we want to stay in, even if negative, because they are familiar. Creating safety in lack of exposition.

Change requires newness and newness requires difference. And difference is uncomfortable. Difference requires growth. And sometimes the change demanded can be so daunting that we decide to stay stuck in our own familiar reality, however painful.

Money is another juicy topic. The moment we have money, we are independent, we are free. But also — we are independent, with no need for help. With no one to come and save us. This was a juicy one for me. The book is worth reading, if only for the chapter on money.

Elliot’s approach to shadow work is quite novel and if it intrigues you at all, I highly recommend you read it. Some of these ideas were swirling while painting this most recent show, “did we save the daylight?” — thinking about my own proclivity to melancholy, to darkness, to the softer side of negative feelings. Finding myself in pain again. Wondering if I was calling it in…

view available paintings

You can view the 13 new paintings here.

Paintings are sold on a first come basis and prices are inclusive of tax. All paintings will ship after the show closes on February 7th.

To purchase or inquire, please reply to this e-mail and cc: Amelie at AL@dorado806.com.

Thank you and hope to see you on Saturday for the opening reception!

All my love and many blessings,

amac

Dorado 806 presents:

did we save the daylight?

Alex Maceda Solo Show

January 27 - February 7, 2023

Opening Reception: Saturday 1/27/24 6 - 9pm

Artist Talk: Wednesday 2/7/24 6 - 7 pm

Closing Reception: Wednesday 2/7/24 7 - 9 pm

Open by Appointment

DORADO 806 Projects is pleased to present ‘did we save the daylight?’ Alex Maceda’s debut Los Angeles Solo Show, opening January 27, 2024. A fearless collection of dark and bold abstract compositions, “did we save the daylight?” features the artist’s largest abstract paintings to date. Inspired by personal loss and the changing of seasons, the collection invites a sense of melancholy and unease in the viewer, while simultaneously suggesting the promise of hope – if not light – ever hidden, but always growing, in our proverbial dark nights of the soul.

In early 2022, Dorado 806 featured Alex Maceda's artwork, making it one of the initial spaces to showcase her talent. Subsequently, she has actively participated in various group shows hosted by Dorado 806.

The gallery will host an opening reception from 6-9p on Saturday 1/27. On Wednesday 2/7, the gallery will host a talk by the artist from 6-7p and a closing reception from 7-9p. Please RSVP to RSVP@dorado806.com. 

ABOUT Alex Maceda:

Alex Maceda (b.1989) is a Filipina-American artist and writer living in Joshua Tree, CA. Her energetic abstract work and lyrical writing explore the medial spaces between waking and dreaming, reality and imagination, literal and abstract. Her work is diaristic in nature, taking inspiration from her internal world, her external landscape, and her interest in esoteric, shamanic, and spiritual themes.

Defined by movement, her abstract practice utilizes the physicality of freeform mark-making and experiments with the materiality of paint and it’s transparency (or lack thereof) to articulate layered, multi-faceted compositions. Her work has been exhibited in Miami, Portland, Los Angeles, and Joshua Tree; she has an upcoming solo exhibition in San Francisco in 2024. Alex holds a BA in Classical Studies and Studio Art from Dartmouth College and an MBA from Stanford Graduate School of Business.

ABOUT DORADO 806 PROJECTS:

Founded in 2021, Dorado 806 Projects is a California coast-based arts and culture collective empowering established and emerging local artists in the heart of Santa Monica. Our studio gallery provides community culture and thought-provocation through an evolving blend of exhibits and workshops, to the westside of Los Angeles. Our creators constantly explore the roles of introspection, inclusion, listening, humor, and play in art being made now, and the art-making process.

CONTACT:

Dorado806.com

Email: al@dordado806.com

Instagram: instagram.com/dordado.806

Some might say I am doing this obsessively, whereas really I am doing this anxiously (stressy & depressy vibes).

Sometimes trying to find something.

Sometimes trying to lose something.

Always something though.

(And isn’t it truly, always, something?)

Ryan Mountain is the highest point in Joshua Tree National Park, 14 miles as the crow flies or a roundabout 33 minute drive from my house. At his top (my understanding is that the mountain’s spirit does in fact identify as a him), he measures 5,496 feet. Ryan Mountain Trail captures 1,050 feet of this incline in a short 1.5 miles, a sassy 3 mile loop up and down. Joshua Tree is the high desert, lest you forget, so even at it’s base you’re at elevation; even at it’s base, you’re high up enough to see.

I started climbing Ryan Mountain because it was hard, and I needed the cardio, and my friend Lily had been doing it and I love Lily (so why not be like Lily?), and honestly because I recently switched gyms and my new one doesn’t have a Stairmaster (fail) and this ass ain’t gonna lift itself (30s!).

The trail is hard enough to clear your head: an all-but-pure Stairmaster-style incline that is especially taxing if you take a speedy clip. With the exception of a short section immediately before the summit, none of it is flat, and all of it is exposed — right now to the cruel winter winds and later in the year to the hot summer sun. The trail loops around the summit slowly showing you, step by step, the 360 degree views that will pour over you, all at once, at the top. It’s not lost on me that while I spin out mentally, I physically choose to spin around this mountain. There’s something there, always something. And there’s something to my increasingly desperate need to summit — to see if I can find some sort of clarity once I get to the vantage point where I get to see it all.

view paintings inspired by the desert

//

Last week I came back from a 5-day silent meditation retreat and I have been thinking about timelines. First, you should know, that I despise people with timelines. And, after sitting silently in stillness, finally letting the past few months catch up with me, I have come to realize: I am a person with timelines. Despite my free-spirited nature, the fearlessness to which I abandoned my former life and started over at 31, my desperate clinging to freedom and dreaming and finding what is true and real instead of what is expected — underneath it all is a desperate clinging to a timeline and all that it represents.

Underneath all that, still, is a fear that I have fallen behind — that I will never catch up, that what is for me has missed me. Underneath my belief in divine timing and the proverbial process, was fear — deep, deep fear. Oh how we deceive ourselves! “The work” really is the unraveling of perceived self-understanding in an ongoing attempt to get at least a glimpse of, self-truth. Ugh.

In a world of uncertainty timelines gave me some semblance of control. Of sequencing. Rationality. Of this will happen, then this, then this. Of things working out ‘as planned.’ A thread I could hold onto (for dear life) in the gaping abyss of the future. But none of this is real; nothing is promised, all of this imagined — yet to happen, perhaps never happening, a sweet trick of self-deception to give myself momentary comfort. What plan? There is no plan. There was never a plan.

“Moha, or delusion, is one of the Buddha’s three poisons,” said my teacher. “All of this: timelines, expectations, where you should be and what you expect of people, all of this in many ways, lives in the realm of delusion. This is coming off as harsh, but I mean this in the most loving way: you are dealing with your own self-deception.”

//

I always find answers on the mountain. The insights seem to spring spontaneously, a voice in my head, a note from soul of land to soul of woman. I wish I could say I write these lessons myself, sprung from my own mind and wisdom, but I do not. I just record them; it’s the elements that share their gifts. Sometimes the lessons are from the wind and how it shifts, sometimes from the stones and how they balance, perfectly but precariously. Sometimes it’s the fire in my heart from the cardio, begging me to keep going despite what is burning down, and sometimes it’s the expansive sky at the top, reminding me that all these things are so small, so so small, in this grand family of things. Sometimes it’s just simply the call to climb the mountain and my ability to listen to it.

That is it, isn’t it? Aren’t we all constantly being called to climb our mountain?

Some days, like yesterday, I leave the summit with no clear answers. I sit on a rock contemplating the desert, the trees, the crows in the distance. I let the cold wind chap my lips and listen intently, wondering what message it has for me today. As I sit, the darkness descends and the temperature drops. I curse myself for starting my hike too late. It feels eerily familiar; I have brought this on myself. I contemplate timelines.

I grasp for my own metaphors in the pregnant silence of the mountain’s voice. And in its absence, I leave and begin my descent back to reality. Taking care as I step down, downwards, contemplating at least the sweat and perhaps my movement (at least I am moving, right?), beginning to lose sight of myself… but then an answer does come, in the form of my favorite sliver of moon above the brightest desert sunset.

I realize I have never seen sunset on Ryan Mountain. I’m always too nervous about the cold and the darkness, too much in a rush to finish at a reasonable time. I’m always too early.

The answer comes. An answer that reminds me I am not late — I am perfectly on time. A tiny waxing crescent, my favorite moon, the small sprout of light pushing up through the darkness of newness, the phase immediately after the new moon. Barely noticeable, but strikingly there.

Yes, an answer comes that reminds me I am not late — that only this timing, my timing, could have resulted in this beauty. This, it is truly divine.

I suppose the answers we seek are sometimes less overt and more subtle sweetness. Sometimes all that is asked of us is just to be, to appreciate that we are, where we are, when we are, and that that allows you to witness this. Whatever the this is today. Whatever this is on mountain you are here to climb.

Thanks for being here. The above essay was seeded by my most recent Instagram post. If you’re not already following along there, please do!

Follow @alexmacedastudio on IG

In the northern hemisphere, Winter Solstice marks the longest night of the year — the day of the most darkness. From Summer Solstice in June to Winter Solstice in December, the days get shorter and colder, the nights deeper and longer. It’s a day, traditionally, that we descend into the shadows. It’s the night where we celebrate darkness.

It is also the day that marks a turning point, a movement toward the light. Starting tomorrow, every day gets longer, lighter, warmer, until we hit Summer Solstice in June. I’ve always chosen to see it like that: Winter Solstice marks the beginning of our ascent towards light. Summer Solstice in the same way, marks our descent towards darkness. The two Equinoxes, Spring and Fall, mark our collective moments of balance: the two days a year light and darkness find equilibrium, the moments where day and night are equal.

Symbolism is nothing — or it is everything. The meaning of anything lies in how we choose to use it, how we engage with the idea and how that engagement sparks a shift in our own lives. If you’re new here, I love symbolism. So I choose to use these things as opportunities for reflection and for a way to mark time.

Winter Solstice marks the beginning of what I consider my ‘new year,’ an 8-week period from Winter Solstice to my birthday (mid February) that I honor as the new year transition. 8 weeks might seem generous, gratuitous even, as a replacement for New Year’s Day. But I find it to be the right pacing for me — we don’t as much turn a corner from one year to another as we engage in a step-by-step transition. At some point we’re here, we keep going, and then we’re there.

Life is a gradient and we would all be better served by an embrace of its medial spaces. My approach here is an invite to myself, and to you as witness, to slow down, reflect, and move intentionally. And so we begin. I find myself today thinking about some phrases that have been particularly resonant — phrases living rent free in my head these days that are indicative of the journey I’ve been on the past calendar year.

I share 6 of them with you below and I hope they spark some sort of reflection for you as well. I think of each of these is a seed of a full essay… I’d love to expand on them all in the new year so would welcome your feedback on which resonates the most. I’d also love to hear what is sticking out for you in your own life, if you’d like to share either in a comment or as a reply to this e-mail.

I wish you a very blessed and beautiful journey as you begin your own ascent into light tomorrow. Thanks for being here, to much more art and writing in 2024. 💖

1) “I’m still out here, with the pills and the dogs.”

As someone oriented towards melancholy, I love a break up song — I love the sadness, the love and the loss, the anger, and occasionally, the gratitude. As I get older, I’m both pleased and mortified to find myself sitting more in gratitude than resentment after my romantic losses. I sometimes find myself craving the rage that used to come post-break-up in my 20s or even more so, the despair. I find myself wanting to lock myself in my room, cry in a pile of bedding, and being shocked that, I just maybe might be, ok?? My therapist of course, loves this for me. But truthfully I miss the drama.

I find myself in a period of loss — and yet, despite my best (worst) efforts, I have been sitting in gratitude which is… interesting. New. Soft. Almost warm. Melancholic, still. Loving, even. I have this song by Noah Kahan, “All My Love,” on repeat, particularly the chorus:

We once sang
Retrograde, we'd shake the frame of your car
Now I know your name, but not who you are
It's all okay
There ain't a drop of bad blood, it's all my love

You got all my love while I'm still out here
With the pills and the dogs, if you need me, dear
I'm the same as I was, it's all okay
There ain't a drop of bad blood, it's all my love
You got all my love

I think it is so sad and yet so beautiful how the people most close to you can become strangers over night. How one might walk away while the other stays, exactly where they are, with the proverbial “pills and dogs.” I think about how people bounce off each other, how that collision might have been needed to shift one’s course into the direction they’re meant to be in. How that direction often leads away from the person they collided with. And how they can have all your love even as you continue on your way, away from them.

2) “I am safe. I have everything I need.”

It took me a long time to get into mantras, but over the past few months I have been using this one a lot. I particularly use it in bed, at night, when I find myself having an anxiety attack. I don’t have anxiety attacks a lot these days, but if I do have them, it’s almost always at night when I am trying to sleep or in the middle of the night when I wake up stressed, almost always, about my art career. And very often, this coincides with a night where I’ve been drinking (which, I have been, more than usual, this fall).

I am not really sure where this mantra came from or how I came to say it, but I’ve been imagining a caring hand petting my head and stroking my hair, while I say over and over again: “I am safe. I have everything I need,” until I can self-soothe and fall asleep. I don’t use specifics and I don’t allow myself to dive into the problems that are causing my anxiety. I don’t allow in any questions of “but…” or “what about…,” I just get to the most core fear: my safety, in all senses of the word, and my fear of lack.

I am safe. I have everything I need.

3) “What if the other shoe doesn’t drop?”

I was talking to my dear friend Ali the other week about waiting for the proverbial other shoe to drop. Of waiting for “the catch” when good things happen to me.

In the past two months, I’ve booked 3 (!) solo shows for 2024. I had my first solo show ever this past September and things have been flying since. I opened another solo on December 1st as the debut show at Joshua Tree Trading Post. On December 7th, I was the featured artist at Life House Hotels for Art Basel in Miami. On December 13th, I showed my work for the first time in New York City as part of a group show at the High Line Nine Galleries in Chelsea. On top of that, I’ve had the most magical personal developments in my life.

Why is this all happening? What did I do to deserve this? And when is it all going to come crashing down?

I’ve been told I present as a very positive person, but historically, I don’t trend optimistic. My therapist likes to call this, “my kink,” the belief that good ONLY occurs with bad. Good and bad obviously are necessary parts of life, but moving through the world feeling like there is a “catch” to everything and everyone is a guaranteed path to constant disappointment. It’s hard to be present for anything good when you are holding your breath for something bad. Needless to say, I’ve been on a multi-year (multi-life?) journey to allow myself to embrace the good.

I mentioned this to Ali and she passed on a question she was asked about the same belief: “What if the other shoe doesn’t drop?” What if it already dropped? What if the good happening is a result of the hard work you put in? What if you deserve this? What if it is just happening, can you embrace it? Can you sit in gratitude and be present with it, without constantly looking around the corner?

What if you just sat with joy, let it wash over you, and let yourself keep going?

4) “When people tell you who they are, believe them.”

I don’t have much to say about this, other than that I am *maybe* finally learning it. 😂 If someone tells you what their priorities are, believe them. If someone behaves in a certain way repeatedly, believe them. If YOU continually prioritize one thing over another, believe yourself. If someone constantly shows up for you, believe them. This is true of friendships, romantic relationships, business partnerships… Most people are not lying about who they are. Past behavior is the best predictor of future behavior. If people behave in a certain way, positive or negative, over and over again, believe them!

It’s important to believe in another’s potential but also important to make decisions based on what they show you, day in and day out. This is a subtweet for many relationships I’ve had this year — most importantly, at the one I have with myself.

5) “Who are you without your resentment?”

In April, I spent 10 days on an ayahuasca and bobinzana dieta, deep in the jungles of Peru. I haven’t written much if anything about this, but this was the turning point in my year. In fact, I believe the above abundance was a direct result of this experience.

It was also the hardest 10 days of my life — physically painful, emotionally exhausting, spiritually difficult. I cannot express how dark this experience was for me and also how beautiful. My experience was all around integrity — how to have it, walk in it, and what was holding me back from it , which was ultimately, my resentment. A lot more on this later, but the question I was asked over and over was, “Who are you without your resentment?” I did not experience myself as a particularly resentful person, but that is the thing with shadow work, isn’t it? You are often blind to what you most need to see. During the 10 days, I relieved innumerable moments of my life where I felt resentment. Vividly, intensely. Things I remembered and things I didn’t. I was showed, over and over again, resentment I was still holding in my heart. How heavy it was and how painful and how much it was holding me back from the light.

“Who are you without your resentment?” the medicine asked me. What a painful question. I’ve offered this to my yoga students over the course of classes this year, and it is a very painful and deep reflection question. One that I am still sitting with and one that I hope to write more about in 2024.

6) “Did we save the daylight?”

Not to be dramatic, but the sun setting at 4p every day has ruined my life. 😂 Daylight savings this year marked a turning point for me — in many ways, my personal life fell apart and then was built back up. My professional life flourished, but in the craziest of ways. And I did my best to be present with all of it: climbing mountains, painting almost 30 paintings, listening as best I could to the shift in the wind.

I still can’t get enough of this silly tweet above — this idea of saving light. This idea of saving ourselves from darkness. The sadness in it, the seed of hope. It had me thinking about solstice and wintering, cocooning and the dark night of the soul. Cocooning especially, how caterpillars literally turn into goop in the darkness of their cocoons before they emerge, in a new form, as butterflies. How growth demands a sacrifice; how we must destroy an old version of ourselves to make room for the new one.

I found myself painting really dark paintings for the first time. My dear friend Rachel suggested I paint at night, something I’ve never done. I dove back into it with my favorite color, Payne’s Grey, a deep dark blue. I was fearless in my mark making. I searched for light despite the darkness, wondering if I could save it, wondering if it was still there. Wondering if I could save myself.

The phrase has become the title of my upcoming debut solo show in LA, “did we save the daylight?” which will be held at Dorado 806 Projects in Santa Monica 1/26/24 — 2/7/24. To say I am excited about this show is an understatement. I believe this is my strongest work to date, imbued with so much passion and questioning and belief and fearlessness. I’m excited to share more in the new year, flyer below.

The opening reception will be Saturday 1/27 from 6-9p and I hope you will join me for it. Please RSVP to RSVP@dorado806.com. 💙 In the meantime, be well. Talk to you soon.

I’ve been spending a lot of time outside lately, climbing mountains, trying to see what the rocks see — lying down on them, wishing I could get absorbed into the sky. I’ve been feeling a shift in the wind, coinciding with the changing of the seasons, coinciding with the seasons of my life.

I used to hate the wind. For years I would say it was my least favorite element: messing up my hair, blowing up my skirt, rude and audacious, forcing everything around me to move when all I wanted was stillness.

“Won’t you just leave the leaves be?” I would think, “Won’t you just let things stay in their same place?”

But everything must move, mustn’t it?

The Wind has been one of my greatest teachers over the past year or so. I’ve been having dreams of her and she has come to me in ceremony. At the beginning of the year, I was working very closely with The Hawk and The Vulture as my guides. I used to experience The Wind as something that wanted to blow you down, deter you, and disturb you. I came to realize The Wind is necessary for you to glide: it carries you to where you want to be. It pushes you out of stagnancy, slowly and quickly, both consistently and out of nowhere.

When I was in Costa Rica this past February for my yoga teacher training, I meditated on the birds of prey that would glide over the ocean everyday, a scene I could see from our yoga shala. My goal there was to build strength, in every sense of the word. I did 6-7 hours of yoga a day, pushing my body and mind in a way that I never had before. Always watching the birds. Admiring the ease of their gliding.

The birds started to come to me in dreams. In one, I became a vulture: I felt the strength of my wings — solid, hard, muscular. I felt the gust of wind that allowed me to ascend in the way that I had seen. I had thought gliding was passive, something that happens to you. But no, it was active: every muscle in my wing held and tensed as I held myself in the air, flying higher and higher, ascending still.

But at the same time, my wings did not flap. There was no movement, only stillness in the strength. Only gliding on the gust of wind that I caught. There was ease in the effort. I realized it was not enough to catch your gust: to hold it, you needed strength, lest it destroy you. The muscles of your body partner with the strength of The Wind. The effort of The Self partners with the blessings of The Spirit.

And so it is.

Fate is not something that happens to you. It is something you partner with. The path is laid out before you but it is you that chooses to step upon it, or turn away.

It is your choice to listen, or to ignore, a shift in the wind.

‘a shift in the wind’ 🌬✨

I am delighted to preview my new collection of paintings, ‘a shift in the wind,’ debuting this Saturday, December 2nd at Joshua Tree Trading Post.

The Trading Post is one of the most iconic venues in Joshua Tree, located in the heart of downtown. Recently renovated by my friends Andrew and Chelsea Evans of Roaming Travels, The Trading Post is a new retail concept featuring an elevated selection of local and small vendors, from curated vintage to handmade hats. I am delighted to be the first artist showing work there, just in time for the holiday season.

‘a shift in the wind’ is inspired by the time I spent outside in the desert in November. I found myself climbing Ryan Mountain multiples times a week, observing the changing sky, and listening deeply to what the desert, and the wind, were telling me.

I am always thinking about where my work will end up, who it will live with and what I want them to experience. Knowing this show would live in the heart of downtown during the holiday season, it was not lost on me that many of the viewers would be visitors to Joshua Tree. I imagined what I would want to send them away with; how to describe what the desert has taught me over the past 3 years, what they might have only experienced a taste of in their weekend away in this powerful place.

As the artist, it’s always a pleasure to take a step back from a body of work and observe the changes that have occurred. In my process, I am so deep in it that it sometimes isn’t until I write these essays where I can see clearly what has happened and offer my reflections.

In that vein, I always welcome what you see and what you notice about any of my new work.

‘Atmospheric’ was how my friend Yvonne described the first few paintings she saw, which I loved. I’ve intentionally been playing with more, and lighter, layers. Working on paintings a few minutes a day, for weeks at a time. Working on creating more depth and the illusion of being able to truly dive into a painting. Working more with contrasting colors and how to depict light. Exploring how to make you feel like you could not only dive in, but fly through, the painting.

Paintings as portals.

Dreamworlds was the original title of this show. I’ve been doing more figurative work lately, painting the spirits I see in my dreams and in my waking life. I’ve been spending a lot of time thinking about where they live — what dimension? What is heaven, and what does it look like, feel like? Or what would it feel like to live in the sky? The seed of this show were those questions: where do these figures live? What is the experience of being in the atmosphere like for them?

The first few paintings have been described as galaxies, which they are. But as I dove deeper, I realized the desert is a dreamworld of itself and a different feeling took over. The longer I stay here and the more quiet I get, the more I lose the sense of what is sky and what is sand, what is above and what is below.

‘As above, so below,’ as they say.

I am always trying to capture that feeling.

All pieces are available and will be on view through end of January. Pieces can ship prior to the holidays by request.

To inquire about or purchase a piece, you can reply directly to this e-mail or buy directly via Joshua Tree Trading Post.

save the date

It’s all happening. If you've gotten this far, I’m excited to announce the following shows happening over the next few months.

• NYC Wed 12/2 — “The Collective” a group show by Visionary Projects at the High Line Nine Galleries in Chelsea. Reception space limited, RSVP here. For Collector Preview, RSVP here.

• LA Sat 1/27 — “did we save the daylight?” a solo show at Dorado 806 Projects in Santa Monica, opening and closing reception details to follow.

• SF Fri 4/5 — solo show at Upper Market Gallery. Opening reception details to follow.

Save the date, more to come, and as always, many blessings and many thanks. 💖