John Storrow

  This is the bathroom sink in the upper rotunda men’s bathroom in the aforementioned Museum where I work. I fell in love with its chrome metal fixtures and the abstract shapes in its reflections. The painting, as of right now, isn’t finished. I would like it to have the same smooth crispness of the chrome faucet and whatever those other two metal things are called.  The MFA has been my other home for decades, I’ve washed my hands in this sink a gazillion times so I guess that’s why I decided to paint a picture of it. Also I love the age old simple process of looking very carefully and trying to record what I see. First I start with a pencil. It’s just me and my canvas in the zone, nothing else. I use my pencil to take all the time I need to measure carefully what I see and try to get it down on the canvas, using the photo as reference. Then it gets my black and white acrylic paint treatment of refinement to get started with the darks and lights. After that I dive in with the ...

  Back around the late 1990’s I used to build balsa wood and tissue paper model airplanes. I loved the magic way they actually fly, and the way the sun shines through the delicate tissue paper skin.This particular plane is a Curtis Jenny biplane that I scratch built from plans dug up on the internet.  I don’t have most of my planes any more but I decided to immortalize this one in a painting. Luckily I had the photo for the painting which tries to capture the light illuminating the two cockpit interiors, and the delicate balsa wood airframe structure. It’s an interesting image to me because you don’t immediately realize it’s a painting of a model plane. You expect an airplane to have seats, instruments, and controls inside each cockpit. You expect a picture of an airplane to show the whole airplane in flight.  Perhaps this picture would make a nice wedding present for somebody. They could imagine getting into the the airplane together and taking off on a grand adventure. ...

  Museum guard booth umbrella  Oil on canvas, 11 x 14, 2023 It reminds me of an alien thing that just made a crater in the earth. I love images like this  that aren’t quite immediately recognizable, you have to pause a moment and figure out what it is.  I love to collect these photos, to use as reference for paintings, of slightly strange things like this that speak to me. I remember it was a sunny day when I was stationed in the guard booth which has large curved windows facing where vehicles enter. I quickly grabbed my phone and took the picture at that moment because the light was just right. I’m glad the umbrella keeps us dry in the rain when we’re at work in the parking lot directing vehicles to the right place at the right time.  Link to this painting on my Etsy page > https://etsy.me/3I1EUxE