Winners & Wannabes

November 20, 2025


In the quiet hum of the studio, where the smell of turpentine mingles with the low murmur of thought, two kinds of painters emerge, each carrying a different kind of fire. One steps to the canvas as though approaching an altar, driven by an inner turbulence that seeks refuge in color and form. For this painter, the brush is not a tool but a lifeline, a conductor through which emotion, memory, and instinct surge into being. The painting becomes a confession, an unraveling, a translation of something that has no words. These works are born out of the pulse beneath the ribcage, out of visions that insist on being seen, out of truths that refuse to remain hidden. They do not ask to be liked; they ask to be felt.

Then there is the other painter, the one who listens not to the inner voice but to the shifting winds of the outer world. This painter studies trends, watches the marketplace with a careful eye, and constructs the canvas with a polished, deliberate hand, ensuring each stroke pleases, aligns, and sells. The work dazzles, often beautifully so, but its heartbeat is faint, calibrated to external expectations rather than internal necessity. These paintings flirt with the viewer, offering charm, elegance, and the comfort of familiarity. They shine, but the shine is borrowed, a reflection of what the world already approves.

Yet both walk the same path, holding brushes dipped into the same spectrum of possibility. The difference lies in where they look when they begin, the first gazes inward, into the vast and trembling wilderness of self, while the second gazes outward, toward applause, recognition, and the glitter of acceptance. One paints to understand life; the other paints to navigate it. And in the end, the canvas reveals the truth of their intentions, each stroke a whisper of the world they choose to serve.