I was looking at the artwork by Mike Capp currently hanging in the hallway gallery at Projectline, admiring the whimsy of his robots, when someone asked me, "I wonder what that's about, the rainbow vomit?" I looked at it for a while longer and I replied, "I don't know. I don't always think it's about anything." That's really where Mike's paintings sit with me. They don't really mean anything dangerous or angsty or irksome. There's no bubbling social commentary. His paintings which incorporate his young childrens' drawings aren't meant to provoke the unarticulated terrors of childhood. They're just drawings of monsters and superheros and robots. I know Mike. I know that even though there's plenty of angst behind his humor, more so there's a playful, impish, boy's mind, full of cartoons and KISS memorabilia. His technique is solid and clean, so he affords himself the privilege of choosing subject material that loose and silly, while still keeping a close eye on small details of color and composition. He paints what feels good and what results are paintings that are funny and frivolous, in a good way. It's not as important to understand what his paintings mean, as it is to understand that they are just what they appear to be. Personally, robots spewing rainbow is delightful and doesn't mean anything more than that.
