Acrylic on canvas, 2026
24 × 36 in.
Artel Gallery announced a black-and-white exhibit, and I found myself searching for a subject.
Then I came across a photograph* of a man wearing an impossible stack of hats.
I didn't know who he was. I didn't know his story. I only knew one thing.
This is it.
The hats were whimsical and theatrical, but the face beneath them was something else entirely—calm, confident, and completely at ease. The image was irresistible. It also inspired the many patterns that would find their way into the hats in the painting.
Only later did I learn the man was Quentin Crisp.
By then, I was already painting him.
As I read more about Crisp, I discovered a writer, performer, and cultural icon whose individuality was impossible to separate from his public life. What had first attracted me as an intriguing image gradually became a portrait of someone who seemed remarkably comfortable being exactly who he was.
The hats drew me in.
The man beneath them kept me there.
