Insomniac Dreams

by Sparrow, January 31, 2012

“I don’t paint paintings, I grow them,” David Austin explains. His art is featured in “Tell Me a Story: Narrative Works,” a group show at Carrie Haddad Gallery in Hudson through March 4.

Born in Berkeley, California, Austin grew up in a farmhouse in rural Fulton County, near Utica. He majored in art at the College of St. Rose in Albany, where he studied traditional techniques of oil painting. Fifteen years ago, when his wife was pregnant, he switched to acrylics to avoid the toxicity of oils. (At that time, his studio was in his apartment.) Austin uses multiple glazes of color, over a base of texture paste, which adds a subtle thickness to the paintings. He works very slowly. One canvas may require 30 layers of paint.

Asked if his dreamlike narratives derive from his sleeping subconscious, Austin replies: “No, the opposite; I get a lot of my imagery from not being able to sleep.” In the twilight state between waking and dreaming, scenes appear to him. Also, during the day Austin carries a notepad to jot down vagrant thoughts.

His first “suit paintings,” in 2005, were a reaction to the wiretapping, extraordinary rendition, waterboarding, and other infringements on civil liberties ushered in by the Patriot Act. Gradually, the paintings have evolved. At first the faces were blurs, like fingerprints, but they are coming into focus. “When I first started painting suits, in my mind they were devious and sinister, but over time, I’ve started to give them souls,” Austin says, chuckling.