October ‘25

I kicked off the month sitting on my patio, sipping coffee, when I (semi) impulse-bought a new canvas that came with a beautiful natural pine floater frame. As soon as I unwrapped it, I knew exactly what it was meant for—a painting I’d been thinking about creating for months.

And so, the process for “Wound Up” began.

When I was in Montana this summer, searching through my sister’s saddle house for inspiration, I took a photo I knew I’d paint someday. It was simple: a lasso hanging on the wall. But I immediately saw it in the monochromatic style I experimented with earlier this year—clean, refined, and modern in a way that honors it’s subject.

This canvas is the largest I’ve worked on to date, so I couldn’t wait to dive in.

After many two-hour sessions (and a few much longer ones), the lasso finally came to life. It turned out to be one of the most challenging paintings I’ve ever made — not because of the concept, but because of the patience it demanded. Something that seems so simple, a rope, is actually made up of hundreds of tiny S-curves, each one tilting at a slightly different angle, each requiring its own shading. By the end, I had painted thousands of them.

I’m proud of how the piece turned out. It captures exactly what I hoped it would: the epic simplicity of a lasso—one of the most iconic tools of the West.