Art of Don DeLeva

I was seeing it from the inside of an plane fuselage along the atmosphere's edge. A rumble and then a feeling of falling... I could see earth from the window and felt the gravitational pull. Everyone in the fuselage was lying down, sleeping or lounging in soft warm cabin light and white sheet bedding. I kissed a long, gentle, slow lipstick kiss to my life. Then I thought "Aim for the Indian Ocean it should be a large target to make a soft landing and the water will extinguish the flames"... But looking back on it,I realize that splashing in water from this height is just like hitting concrete at 20,000 MPH, besides I wasn't the one piloting the fall.

This morning came with a thick fog  "I only have i's 4 U" seeped through my mindscape with inky black of cold dark space. You can ask me why things like this happen but I can't tell the younger ones because there is no Google in my mind. Besides it would only give you an answer that was human conceived for the next 25 years. Made with humans in mind by humans for humans wanting to find their purpose. But these thoughts are being interrupted by my  morning protein mega tablet scrambled with crisp edges. Something I discovered by mistake by almost burning my eggs 15 years ago. Hell yes I like it. What is the motivation for A.I. to excel at being ?  If humans want sex, riches, money etc... what would motivate a machine to evolve? Will machine learning have programs that make random mistakes? (the invention of Post it Notes). Look it up on Google since we already made the mistakes that AI didn't have to. If we do program in mistakes then arnt we just making huma...

In the years before our vision was electronic enhanced I could see things that were not there. I lost the ability to see my thoughts when I got my zoom and macro enhancements. So weird how I thought I would have been able to keep that gift I had. How much of my mind is "hooked up" to the visualization of  reality? Yes my illusion of reality. Diving into a rainy Seattle at 5:23am in the morning is an inky experience with the janky sever lights blinking from every building, crane and oncoming cars.

This year's challenges have been convoluted and time consuming. So much so that painting has not been in immediate attention. While my mind wishes there could be less change, life seems to have sharp changes in mind that everyone has to face. I just need to loose my perception of life and welcome reality.

I started this year's MoNA, Museum of Northwest Art Auction 2018, painting this week. I am going to do a progression of the painting so you can see how it comes together. 4.01.2018- Due to several life changes this last month I have had little time to work on the painting I was going to donate to the MoNA auction. SO this painting will be worked on but will not appear in the MoNA 2018 Auction. The first post starts March 3 2018 just scroll down to see the first entry: No. 5 front 03/07/2018 I decided at this point to start to centralize an image.  It is so ominous mixing grey from earth tones, Ocher Yellow, Iron Gesso, Oxide black and Indian red. This thick mix of opaque grey blots out the sky, it is the wall graffiti block out color that never seems to match the concrete.  No. 4, front 03/07/2018 No. 3,  front 03/5/2018   This is the first layer / wash of color to build up the structure. It is an old technique I learned from my oil painting...

Let me just preface this painting with the fact that paper dolls can not cut themselves out... title 1: Paper Doll title 2: Once I Was A Paper Doll, Now I Am A CSS Stylesheet Medium: Acrylic on panel Size: 6" x 6" x .05" Date: 12/17/2017 C-log: #12172017 Web: www.dondelevaart.com Story: Maybe the second title needs more explaining. One night, after coding my website and drinking numerous RedBulls I fell asleep at the keyboard... I dreamt I was paper doll and that my friends and I were going out clubbing in Seattle. I wanted to change my clothes but paper dolls can't change their clothes and neither can they cut out their outfit. So instead of trying to use scissors I decided to code myself a new look in CSS and sure enough, it worked! I got so carried away that I fashioned myself a Prince like outfit minus the ruffles but adding a string of pearls.

This is part of a new sort of post method for me since, I seem to be so sporadic. I am going to try to give a photo evolution  history for each painting. This is the first one. At this point there is no title of the painting, but you will see as I paint the title of the work will change. 3/4/18-UPDATE on the stump painting: Still nothing. It is sitting in my studio staring at me. So times it take months. I have had paintings take years to finish.  2/08/18- At this point I seem to have come to a stand still on this painting. Not really sure why, I just can't seem to get a good look on what is going on and where it is going. Time away from it is a good thing. No. 9 front 01/31/2018 At this point I am around 70% complete. I will be saturating the colors but I am still discovering the image. No.8 front 01/26/2018 A working title : Kitty and the Swan No.7 side- 01/22/2018 Sometimes I find turning a  painting on it's side and paint helps to find out th...

Candy Breath is a first attempt to bring both my Pop Surrealist and Abstraction tendencies together. As you view the painting you can start to see cartoonist features blend into realistic features that are abstracted and then disappear. I do this give the impression of a personality changing as mood changes and conversation ebbs and flows. This painting SOLD in the "VISIONS EN ROUGE" (link to show) , Confluence Gallery (link to gallery) , Twisp Wa. 12/2017

Kitty Noire:  wood panel, silver mylar wall paper, acrylic paint, varnish,  6"x 6"x 0.5 . 08.09.2017 I started painting on wall paper, this is on Silver Mylar it's more of an experiment. At work I have access to so many types of surfaces that I decided to start taking advantage of the scraps and recycling bins.

RoboCat:  wood panel, acrylic paint, varnish,  6"x 6"x 0.5 . 08.09.2017 SOLD : Trisha Gallagher Collection, Tacoma, WA-->

Here is a photo of my last 4 paintings. Keep in mind these are the single images that make up my abstracts.

MeBot and Timmy are two characters I have been panting for a while now. They have been in many abstracts It's only now that I have painted them on their own. MeBot : Acrylic on wood, 6x6 Timmy : Acrylic on wood, 6x6 This Idea of an Alphabet This morning while painting an abstract I started to realize that it might help people understand my more complicated work if I paint my characters in a non abstract way. Kind of like sounding out letters phonetically until you understand how to pronounce a word.  This is how I understood how to listen to noise music.    

I am asked quite often why are my paintings so busy. I don't see them as busy, I see them as 3 or five paintings in one.

Huxley's Dream:  clay board panel, acrylic paint and gold leaf, varnish,  6"x 12"x 2.25. 2/2017. I was reading "The Doors of Perception " by Aldous Huxley during the painting of this work. One does not need to be under the influence of mind altering substances to understand the malleability of reality and how we consistently change our perception of the now to assess and comprehend our present. My art de-focuses focal point in order to challenge the viewers perception of what they are looking at. My paintings are meant to "visually change" as moods, sounds and environment change. The work is not so much about the image, but more about the perception of the viewer. My goal is to get the viewer to actually "see" themselves think.

The Wall Street Bailout. This is a video of paintings inspired by the wall street bail out. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCeZlpAULBzN7XXESz6VpAYw

She War Heels:  Wood panel, acrylic paint, varnish,  5"x 7"x .275. 1/23/17

My Black Cape:  clay board panel, acrylic paint, varnish,  5"x 7"x .175. 2016 SOLD : Steve Nelson Collection, Indianola, IA

https://youtu.be/-nO9X2vOZTk painting video "cool defiance"

Madison Price :  .250 Ply wood, acrylic paint, varnish,  8"x 10" 10/2016 SOLD: Marty and Tony Price. This painting brings me to a place in my work that is easy to criticize. It's a cat dressed in a jacket... Why do I feel the need to explain this? One, I painted it as a gift. Two, I have a cat and yes I think she is cute as hell. Three, I have come to a place in my 30 years of painting that I am done with the critics in my head and hands. I just want to paint. I have only about 15 to 20 years left and I just want to paint and promote it the way that is most comfortable to me. Maybe you get to a place in your life that you realize the things that are truly you are the most powerful for you. For example, I would much rather be painting then socializing. I think this has been a major component in why my work is not more commonly known.