Bad Mutha Wizard 2008

Dave Macdowell’s painting gives us a Wizard of Oz scene with Samuel L. Jackson’s face hovering above Dorothy and her friends like a bad dream. Imagine Macdowell in his studio, figuring out how to make that giant face both scary and funny, how to turn a familiar movie scene into something completely unexpected. The surface looks smooth, so maybe he worked with thin layers of paint, building up the image slowly, adjusting the colors to get that weird, theatrical lighting just right. There’s something so satisfying about the way the colors clash and vibrate against each other, and how those flames lick the air. The painting makes me think about the way we borrow from each other, riffing on old themes and stories to make something new. It's a reminder that art is always in conversation.