My mom enjoyed painting canvases from time to time when I was growing up. Once in a while I would try to paint a picture. Sometime in the 90’s before we moved to Vallejo, while we were still living on Waller Street, I decided to paint over a painting someone had given me some years before. The canvas was about 3 feet by 3 feet and I got a few paints and brushes and looked for an image to paint. I found an image in a hip-hop magazine of the time and started painting. 

Milton kept discouraging me. He would say things like, “You don’t know how to paint,” and “Your not going to hang that on our walls.” I persisted and kept painting. When I was finished, I did hang it on a wall and got compliments from friends when they came over. I decided to paint more. Milton relented and went with the flow and, eventually, I think he came to appreciate my paintings. 

My main focus at the time was ‘black males.” I painted a few pictures of Milton and his dad and most of the other images I just found in magazines. People seemed to enjoy them and so I decided to do a few shows in Vallejo and San Francisco. I bought an “Easy-up” tent and did a few street fairs. It was all much fun although I didn’t sell enough to make it profitable. The more I tried to sell the paintings, though, the less I wanted to paint. For a few years, I painted several a year. Then I lost interest and just painted once a year or so when I became inspired. You can see other paintings that are not a part of the “Black Males…” collection elsewhere in my “Life Stories.” Click edit button to change this text. Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Ut elit tellus, luctus nec ullamcorper mattis, pulvinar dapibus leo.