An ongoing series of experimental pieces I began in January, 2011 by rolling out a sheet of cheap paper on the table of my college apartment. I used an eye-dropper to lay down ink blots, blew air over them to make interesting shapes before they dried, then chose colored pencils almost at random to fill in all the closed shapes. One objective was to ensure that no two adjacent shapes had the same color, or colors of the same name (like lime green vs forest green,) similar to how colors are chosen for states or countries on a map. My best friend Cody Snyder worked tirelessly on this project with me, helping to develop the basic rules and parameters. Because he and I both love maps and funk music, he named this style Cartographunk, a portmanteau of cartography and funk. Over the last 14+ years, I’ve taken to using Cartographunk as a form of art therapy, and have expanded on the possibilities of this process, developing my own particular style with it.

The pieces on this page are either standalone experiments, or small-scale studies to test various techniques, which preceded larger-format pieces.

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