Hold On !
The square format centers the violent arc of action, making the toss and the bull’s buck equally dominant forces within the picture plane. Diagonals created by the bull’s spine and the rider’s airborne limbs generate a centrifugal rhythm that pushes color outward and pulls the eye around the canvas. The background’s swirling fields act as atmospheric counterpoint, turning negative space into a rotating stage that heightens the sensation of being mid-fling.
A saturated palette of blues, reds, oranges, and purples reads as both skin and atmosphere, transforming physical strain into chromatic drama. Broad, energetic strokes create layered surfaces where opacity and translucence trade places to suggest dust, sweat, and motion blur. Contrasting warm and cool zones enable the central figures to emerge by vibration rather than outline.
The rider is depicted in a moment of loss of contact, limbs extended and body tilted back, which shifts narrative emphasis from mastery to vulnerability. The bull’s compact, coiled mass remains the painting’s engine, its tense musculature suggested by angular, painterly marks rather than anatomical finish. This economical figuration foregrounds gesture and relationship over literal depiction.
The painting stages a question of control versus surrender and reframes spectacle as an encounter with physical risk and impermanence. Motion is translated into emotional cadence so the work reads as an exhalation as much as an event. The piece also probes ritualized violence and communal gaze, asking viewers to consider why we are drawn to moments of imminent collapse.
At 48 by 48 inches the work commands proximity and benefits from eye-level installation so viewers can trace the brushwork and feel the centrifugal pull. Directional lighting from a low angle will accentuate impasto and reveal gestural nuances. A minimalist frame or exposed stretcher will keep the energy contained while allowing the painting’s surface to remain the primary point of engagement.
My life in the last 4 years has been like riding a bull, cannot let go and yet it tough to hold on to the end.
A saturated palette of blues, reds, oranges, and purples reads as both skin and atmosphere, transforming physical strain into chromatic drama. Broad, energetic strokes create layered surfaces where opacity and translucence trade places to suggest dust, sweat, and motion blur. Contrasting warm and cool zones enable the central figures to emerge by vibration rather than outline.
The rider is depicted in a moment of loss of contact, limbs extended and body tilted back, which shifts narrative emphasis from mastery to vulnerability. The bull’s compact, coiled mass remains the painting’s engine, its tense musculature suggested by angular, painterly marks rather than anatomical finish. This economical figuration foregrounds gesture and relationship over literal depiction.
The painting stages a question of control versus surrender and reframes spectacle as an encounter with physical risk and impermanence. Motion is translated into emotional cadence so the work reads as an exhalation as much as an event. The piece also probes ritualized violence and communal gaze, asking viewers to consider why we are drawn to moments of imminent collapse.
At 48 by 48 inches the work commands proximity and benefits from eye-level installation so viewers can trace the brushwork and feel the centrifugal pull. Directional lighting from a low angle will accentuate impasto and reveal gestural nuances. A minimalist frame or exposed stretcher will keep the energy contained while allowing the painting’s surface to remain the primary point of engagement.
My life in the last 4 years has been like riding a bull, cannot let go and yet it tough to hold on to the end.