Over the past month I've gotten many comments and answered many questions about my series, Dirty Dirty Love. In response I've decided to put together a statement explaining it's genesis, concept, content and future...

Dirty Dirty Love began, when in late 2006, I asked a married couple if I could document them for one evening. At the time I was working on a series of paintings about intimacy and wanted to capture that all too familiar, real-life connection only a married couple has. I was lucky enough to find a young couple who volunteered to let me into their home, and into their lives for a few hours one cold December night. The images that I captured told a story beyond what I had intended. Over the next few months I worked on that series of drawings, fleshing out what would evolve into a collection of highly intimate, psychological sexual portraits that bespoke of something more than just intimacy. Dirty Dirty Love was born.

Realizing that I wanted to tell more stories, I began reaching out to friends and models to share their sexual secrets - aiming to create images based on the unique experiences of an array of people. I was amazed at the overwhelming response I received. It occurred that while most people thought their experiences unique, and therefore embarrassing, disgraceful, reprehensible or occasionally liberating, more was shared between their intimate habits than not. In direct opposition to the way in which sex is portrayed in the mainstream - viewed as either a commodity or as something reprehensible - I wanted to depict it in it's true nature, something essential, something common, something mundane. Dirty Dirty Love aims to reexamine the role of sexual predilection in our daily lives and reveal the universal bonds that make sex a more shared experience than is presently accepted. Each image is drawn directly from the personal narratives of the models depicted. Without relying on shocking or graphic images, and without skirting or self-censoring content, each painting balances the act of sex with a greater, emotive intent. It's the purpose of each painting to place sex upfront without falling pray to the exploitive treatment we have come to accept in our society - providing a new and considerate way to open discussion about the themes involved without prejudice or bias. My goal is that the audience effectively forgets that these are images of and about sex, and begins to appreciate them as something much more.

At its very heart, Dirty Dirty Love illustrates how people find a sense of deeper connection in a world wrought with increased social isolationism and aggressive reprisal. It's a invitation to understanding and ultimately acceptance. Dirty Dirty Love is sex, simple, diverse, as ordinary and as unique as you and I.