The Marketing Machine, the Uncomfortable Truth, and Getting Back to the Paint
If you’ve been following along here for a bit, you know I’ve spent a good chunk of 2026 throwing myself back into the deep end of re-marketing my art online.
Context for the uninitiated: years ago, I pulled back from selling my work entirely because I hit a wall where the whole endeavor felt too salesy, too exhausting, and like an awful lot of administrative drag for very little soul return.
This time around, I’ve actually learned a ton. Turns out, I genuinely love tweaking custom code and fiddling with website design (which shouldn't surprise anyone who knows my background). I’ve even enjoyed figuring out the puzzle of social media—learning how reels and carousels work, finding the creative pocket in short video, and connecting with folks who genuinely dig what I make.
You KNOW there’s a massive BUT coming.
What I do not love is the quiet, pervasive pressure to put on a sanitized, hyper-curated front just to stay "palatable" for an algorithm.
I’m not talking about professional content creators—they have to play the game of trending audio, viral hooks, and cookie-cutter templates because content is their product. But I’m not selling content. I’m making art. And trying to maneuver through the endless, noisy social media miasma every single hour of every single day just to fight for "reach" has brought me face-to-face with a stark reality:
I’m not sure I care about playing that game anymore.
The moment the effort to be seen starts dictating what happens inside my studio, the system is broken. Art isn't just a means to an end for me, and it certainly isn't a pipeline for "product." It is literally the thing that keeps my brain balanced. (Just ask Tom—if I’m not in the studio making paint fly, nobody is having a good time.)
Back in the day, when I was neck-deep in web development, I ran a personal playground of a website called flawed.com. It was my space to experiment, mess up, try wild ideas, and say what I actually thought without corporate polish. My tagline sitting right at the top was simple:
"I am not here to make you feel comfortable."
It was a soft warning to anyone who stumbled in expecting a polite, sanitized presentation.
So where does that leave things now?
I’m not burning the website down, and I’m not walking away from the parts of this process I genuinely enjoy. But the polite, overly curated, careful filter? That’s going in the bin.
Moving forward, things around here might get a little louder, a little looser, and a lot more honest. More raw process, less algorithmic polish, and a lot more of the unedited fire that made me fall in love with painting in the first place.
If you're here for real art, messy studio truth, and work that doesn't apologize for taking up space—welcome. It's good to be back.