The KISS, 6x8', encaustic oils on stretched canvas, 1980. built to exude - whatever.
Many times I was going through life changes myself and I felt the Kiss works in ceramics, bronze, canvas, paper, they were all explanations of what I was experiencing and saw.
It was always easier doing the paintings- and considering them done and me done with the kiss, as well. I had to have some outlet for my own id to see the whole thing and be gone.
I was brought up in religious fundamentalism that preached love and that was to be the way you lived your life-yet love was always such an abstract notion as a kid. Then I learned to kiss. This fascination led me into many adventures in manhood. The Kiss was always the beginning of everything. The touch really was the beginning. Then I was lost in a spiraling orbit with another person who was in awe of what we had going. I simply let one thing lead to another til I was gone with the wind- and then I was down the road doing a painting of it all.
In South Korea, I was a visiting artist (1995-19)-with a Japanese artist, Bokuden Matsuda. My sponsor and fellow artist from S. Korea, Hwang, Weon Cheol. We started a show with the three of us, World Peace Through Art, 1995-2019. I showed a number of works titled, KISS. In public, there was no kissing, nobody kissed. So they fell in love with my kiss works and wanted me to return with a whole show with the kiss theme. In my case, because I was from the U.S.A. and Hollywood, ( as an entitlement of sorts)- they could enjoy what was forbidden in their own culture done by a foreigner. ( We never really tested this idea- so it is only a whim or a concept-OK !)And it looks like it is not going to be done now, for sure.