Chaos Theory
2006 - 18"x24" Acrylic, colored pencil, charcoal, ink, on canvas.
(Private Collection - New York)

Chaos Theory was created during a stressful time of my life when I was getting very little sleep. I worked on this painting over a period of several months, mostly during the hours of 3:00 - 5:00AM. Painting was the only thing that helped relax my mind. It served as a way to release all the chaos in my head onto the canvas. Painting turned out to be an effective form of mental therapy. Maybe all those people out there wasting their money on shrinks, with disappointing results, should take up painting instead:)

The title has a double meaning:
1. The painting is a visual representation of the chaos going on in my head. The blue section represents the little bit of solitude from 3-5AM I had each day. I am in the lower part of the blue section. This is as close as I will ever get to a self-portrait painting of myself.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

2. Chaos Theory is the science of finding an underlying order in things that appear to be totally random and unpredictable . A good example would be predicting the weather. It's a complex set of equations with many variables that is still not fully understood, which is why the weather forecasters are wrong much of the time.

To the untrained eye, abstract art may look all the same. However, once you study enough abstract art, you realize that it's not that random. There's enough relevant data in a painting that you can identify the artist once you become familiar with their work. In a sense, you eyes and brain are doing the fractal theory analysis to determine if what your are looking at is a DeKooning, Pollock, or Motherwell. This is my Chaos Theory as it applies to abstract art.

Where this gets more complicated is when you have an artist who is trying to duplicate the style of another artist. In 2005, thirty two paintings that looked like Jackson Pollock's were discovered in a storage warehouse. While Jackson Pollock's drip paintings may look completely random; they are not. Scientists used fractal theory to identify complex patterns in authentic Pollock paintings so they could determine if the paintings in questions contained the same complex patterns. Both the Jackson Pollock art experts, and the scientists had inconclusive results.

If you want to see an entertaining movie/documentary related to authenticating artwork, rent "Who The F*** Is Jackson Pollock". It's about a lady who purchases a painting from a thrift store. A friend tells her it looks like a Jackson Pollock and it could be worth lots of money. She begins the difficult task of having art experts and scientists authenticate the painting. Rent the movie to find out how the story ends.