adrien converse /// visual artist

Visual artworks by Adrien Converse

Category: Art

  • Listen to the Living

    Listen to the Living

    Do you listen to the dead
    Or listen to the living?
    Do they both demand of you
    To give and keep on giving?

    Feeding on your every hour
    Absorbing all your strength and power
    Until the day that you have died
    Equally unsatisfied—

    Yes, you could listen to the dead …

    Or, listen to yourself instead.

    That’s a little poem I wrote way back in 2017, to accompany this painting, which is currently featured in my show, Medicine of the Forest.

    Listen to the Living, acrylic and mixed media on 9″x12″ wood panel.

    I used a fun medium on this piece which I haven’t dabbled with in a long time … cold wax. It’s a sort of encaustic wax that you don’t have to heat for it to be malleable. I’m not totally clear on the chemistry of how that even works.

    This is unfortunately true of a lot of the supplies I work with. I know how to use the materials and make stuff turn out cool but I have little depth to my knowledge of what the actual chemistry is.

    Not just how materials function independently, but how they are produced, their impact on water, air, and soil, and how they interact with other materials to create different compounds immediately and over longer periods of time.

    It’s a lot to learn and I have found it intimidating. Mainly because it makes me incrementally more aware of how poorly humanity is stewarding our material reality on a systemic level.

    Every day I learn a little more though. It’s one of my long term goals: to understand the chemistry of the materials I work with so well that that knowledge itself becomes a core component of the art.

    In many ways that has already been the case from the beginning. But there’s a lot of leveling up to do.

    Because the times, they are a-changin’.

    —Adrien

  • Leave it better than you found it

    Leave it better than you found it

    We’re just over a week since my art show launch (really? only that long??) and it’s amazing how much getting over the hurdle of making my first show in five years visible in the world has energized me.

    A lot of my energy has been directed towards deep cleaning, organizing, repairing old torn canvases and scuffed artworks, and in general just making the spaces I participate in nicer to exist in.

    And on a more metaphysical note, throwing away all the judgmental and degrading opinions that have been clogging up my space.

    When you’re real, there is no “buffer” between peoples’ rudeness and your actual self. Which is why a lot of artists protect themselves with a persona of some kind. Then when that persona gets judged, it’s a sort of armor that defends the real person.

    I was ashamed of myself when I realized life was a costume party and I attended with my real face.

    —Franz Kafka

    People can costume up if they want. In my perspective that feels like treating peak “culture” like some kind of tween drama. It strikes me as both immature and cowardly.

    For better or worse, that’s never been my style and I can confidently say it never will be.

    Have I faced consequences for that? Oh you bet your butt I have.

    But that doesn’t mean I have to get hurt all the time. Another way to deal with it is to develop the kind of self respect that more or less functions as a shop vac for peoples’ bullshit.

    DOWN THE CHUTE, a charcoal drawing I made by my dad’s bedside in his last days while he was dying of cancer.

    The only reason a lot of people are as full of shit as they are is that they’ve never actually stood in front of someone they knew could see all the way through it.

    When you think everyone is too stupid to know you’re not being real, you’re going to treat everyone like they’re too stupid to help you take your stupid mask off.

    Maybe people aren’t stupid; maybe they are too busy doing the hard work of being real to care about the costume party you think they should dress up for to buffer them from the consequence of authenticity.

    And maybe curating a fake face doesn’t make you better than everyone who has the spine to be seen for who they are.

    —Adrien

  • Old Scene // New Scene

    Old Scene // New Scene

    Hi! Get ready for some more art.

    I’ve been doing standup lately at local bars here and there, not because I’m trying to become a professional comedian but because I’m already funny whether on purpose or not, and it’s an enjoyable way to participate in community over the weird stuff that happens in life. (As well as to practice public speaking skills.)

    It’s been a cool experience gradually befriending folks in that scene. So far I have never done the same material twice and I think they are starting to notice … I am learning that’s actually very uncommon.

    A lot of my content has been orbiting around this thing I have dealt with my whole life where people just assume I am evil and/or trying to hurt them not because I am, but because I’m not following their expected script.

    It has been a ridiculous theme which is old and tired and ready to die. There are other things to joke and laugh about which are gradually taking up more of my minimal airtime at the mic. For example, last time I did an entire set only talking about slugs. It was stupid but we all had fun.

    A lot of people get into different art scenes and it quickly stops becoming about the art and starts becoming about positioning.

    How do I be the one who gets the good spots? The praise? The notoriety? The attention?

    They forget that MOST of what makes any art meaningful is not how cool or smart the “performer” is … it’s that people are willing to engage in good faith.

    The magical sparks of connection and electricity generated in any real art scene come from mutual good faith in both directions. As I have said many times about what makes art ART:

    Presence, not product.

    I made this painting while processing a lot of the things I felt I had in common with my dad while he was still here on this material plane before dying of cancer back in 2023.

    He understood that a real art “scene” doesn’t come from prestige or posturing. It comes from unpretentious authenticity, as well as the courage to actually participate in what it really feels like to be alive.

    This acrylic painting, which I made on his deck with a view before me and my siblings sold his house—his last piece of art he made—is called OLD SCENE // NEW SCENE.

    Much like the entitled judgments that get hurled at me constantly for not following some tired old script are the presumptions of smallminded people who get caught up in the form of art while sacrificing its purpose.

    Which scene do you want to be in?

    One that forces compliance or one that creates opportunity for connection?

    There is always a choice.

    Peace,

    Adrien

  • not a rebel; just a normal person (observer/fabricator)

    not a rebel; just a normal person (observer/fabricator)

    The posts are flowing at a steady clip right now and that’s because I have a huge amount of work that has long awaited finding a place in a context like this one.

    So the mighty several of you who jumped in and subscribed to my brand new email updates are getting quite the blast of content.

    I’m not about to apologize for that—presumably you’re here because you like what I’m about. If you didn’t I’d surely have repelled you a long time ago by now. As I mentioned to several folks over banter about my art at my show opening last week, a lot of what I’m saying and doing is “not exactly subtle.”

    However I wouldn’t call it exotic or “out there” either.

    Years ago I bought a shirt which I wore to shreds because I loved it so much. It was an album shirt for Thom Yorke’s Tomorrow’s Modern Boxes. If you’re unfamiliar Thom Yorke is the lead singer of Radiohead.

    If you stood facing a mirror wearing that shirt, you’d see reflected back underneath the geometric design the phrase “THE TRUTH IS ORDINARY.”

    Correct.

    Observer/Fabricator, charcoal drawing. Another feature in my show, Medicine of the Forest.

    Getting more specific, the truth about me is ordinary.

    I’ve had a lot of people frame me as some kind of rebel. The thing is, in order to be a rebel there would need to be some kind of authority I am supposedly rebelling from.

    What authority am I actually under, which I am going against? Who am I going against by continuing to exist? If someone thinks I am against them due to the fact that I am continuing to exist, wouldn’t it seem that they perhaps need some support for their emotional and mental health?

    Because my existence is not a political stance or an ideology. It is a purely neutral fact.

    Me taking care of my basic needs so I can continue to create value in society and support the people I love is not some kind of extremist behavior.

    Glad we cleared that up.

    Peace,

    Adrien

  • protecting what we love

    protecting what we love

    A theme in many peoples’ lives (mine being no exception) is watching “leaders” and people with varying forms of power and authority willfully play dumb when harm is done.

    Their response—or lack thereof—is not something we can change.

    However, our respect is something we can relocate. They don’t care to hold the kind of line that continued respect demands, do they?

    There is a difference between a leader and someone placed in a leadership position. As painful as it is, allowing ourselves to metabolize our disappointment in them is a power move.

    Their roles are just built on catchy marketing for bad products that nobody benefits from buying. Textbook definition of predation: selling something that isn’t what it seems to feed on those taking things in good faith. Is that what leaders do?

    We don’t have to keep acting in a poorly-cast play.

    We can just be ourselves and stand for what we stand for.

    When someone fails to be the kind of boss that makes good things happen, there is no reason to listen to them anymore when they tell you what’s real. They have disqualified themselves. Whoops.

    Below is one of the pieces that drew the most attention in my recent show … and I fielded a lot of timid versions of this question:

    What were you thinking about when you made this piece?

    The title of this post is a good summary.

    This is VENGEANCE, created gradually over the course of many years.

    24″ x 36″ acrylic on canvas.

    Whatever happens, I’m not interested in letting apathy in the face of injustice rub off on me. That’s not a “normal” I accept.

    You don’t have to either.

    Peace,

    Adrien

  • You Lack Discipline

    You Lack Discipline

    One of my favorite pieces lately is probably not likely a crowd favorite, though I did give it a prominent feature in my February exhibit.

    It’s this 9″ x 12″ chalk on paper drawing which I made back in 2021, titled You Lack Discipline.

    This piece responds to a common piece of feedback I (and many others) have ironically received a whole lot of in life …

    A core operational mechanic of the self-important entitled person is to assume that if you’re not doing what they think you should be doing, it’s because you need more discipline in your life.

    They might even step in and publicly attempt to discipline other fully-grown adults who are handling important things they don’t even bother to imagine could be possible.

    How about this:

    1. I have my own priorities
    2. small-minded dweebs don’t get to decide what those should be
    3. they can sit the f*ck down and shut the f*ck up.

    Peace,

    Adrien

  • The paradox of “creation”

    The paradox of “creation”

    Hi.

    Last night’s exhibition opening went awesomely and I am very pleased by the many thoughtful conversations I had with so many different folks who showed up.

    Photo below snapped by the amazing Kaeley of KPH and the Canary Collective, a fellow artist in the area whose heartfelt and courageous work I respect a lot.

    Of note, I struck up a chat with someone who melts down plastic trash and turns it into furniture, as well as someone getting a nonprofit off the ground focused on regenerative science in the area. I’m happy my work set the scene for subjects like this to bubble up organically, because these are exactly the types of things I want to engage more in the long term.

    I think about trash a LOT, and have since I was a little kid. I remember as a six year old watching a Bible study teacher clean up a juice spill using half a roll of paper towels, and feeling dread creep into the pit of my stomach about how carelessly we humans constantly create garbage. The awareness of this problem has persistently lurked in the back of my mind (and often the front) as something I hope to one day participate in much less helplessly.

    The weight of this has only been amplified for me in recent years by a vast number of things, including my dad’s passing in 2023, caused by several different kinds of cancer.

    We’re learning a lot about the impact of how we’re stewarding (or not stewarding) our physical reality here on this planet we call home and I’m here for the homework. Not the anesthesia.

    Which brings me to the art piece I’m compelled to share today in this post.

    This 30″ x 30″ mixed media painting on canvas was purchased years ago so the original is not available. However there may be a rogue print or sticker here or there as this has been a popular conversation-starter piece.

    One of the main reasons for that is the somewhat tongue-in-cheek title that goes with it …

    Creation.

    Why would this piece have that title?

    I’ll let you explore your own theories.

    Peace,

    Adrien

  • Nice Try 👁️

    Nice Try 👁️

    Hello!

    My art show, Medicine of the Forest, opens in just a few hours, and I am quite stoked about bringing this collection of work into view in the place and time that lined up so naturally.

    It was a fun process to collaborate with the gallery staff on choices about how to arrange the somewhat quirky work within the somewhat quirky space. I am far from the only creative mastermind in the building.

    I chose to feature a piece in the show that I am not currently willing to part with (though one day that might change; you never know).

    It’s a little 8″x8″ acrylic painting which has been hanging in a very specific location in my own personal space since I made it about six months ago.

    There’s a lot that could be said about this piece, though I always like to leave plenty to the viewer’s imagination. I’ll just name a few statements that you can work with as you please:

    • A lot of people sure think they can get away with whatever they want, expecting never to experience consequences
    • Sometimes all it takes to send a would be perpetrator scurrying away mumbling “unfair!” is to look directly at them when they try to violate a boundary
    • “No” is an excellent word and saying it when you need to does not make you evil

    This piece is marked “not for sale” at the show, however, I did get a whole bunch of 3″ x 3″ stickers made through the local sticker shop in town. They were kind enough to do a rush job for me so that I’d have them in time for the show opening tonight. They turned out awesome!

    Unless these stickers are insanely popular and all get snatched up tonight, they will likely be available at Make.Shift Art Space during their open hours throughout the month.

    I’m keeping the painting, but the idea behind the painting is an idea FOR THE PEOPLE.

    Get one, stick it somewhere, claim your space.

    Looking forward to a fun evening.

    Peace,

    Adrien

  • No more “ghost” era

    No more “ghost” era

    The drawing and poem below come from all the way back in 2017 …

    I made a ghost of you
    We hang out all the time
    He’s everything that makes you you …
    According to my mind

    Still lingering in a corner on a number of older art pieces, like the markings of a child trapped in liminal space, is the strange moniker “lurm.”

    I retired this moniker years ago but the ghost of this ghost has echoed awhile as it continues to fade.

    This “nickname” I guess you could call it came my way during a heavy time where my artistry and intelligence had been muffled, disembodied, and sidelined into an almost cartoonish caricature of myself. One that was soft enough and whimsical enough to never command authority or center stage.

    It sure would be more convenient for many if my ethos were more decorative rather than piercing; more cutesy rather than demanding of action.

    But that’s just not really who I am or who I ever was.

    For a time “lurm” functioned as a sort of escape pod from a narrowminded social infrastructure that judged and limited my artistic expression. But that escape pod became its own prison.

    My playfulness reduced to childish naivety; my levity in the face of pain reduced to a fairy-like disposition held by someone nobody needed to take seriously.

    That name “lurm” was never a real person; just a ghost that made a lot of people more comfortable to avoid the gravity of what someone forced into my position would be required to endure.

    It’s not that that era has ended so much as that it was only ever a little play, running on little stages while real life went on without being attended to in the way that was necessary.

    So that’s why I say “no more” rather than “the end.”

    What never began in the first place doesn’t really need to end, now does it?

    Take care,

    Adrien

  • Who is the audience?

    Who is the audience?

    One of the conundrums of being an artist who is very much not driven by validation is the constant psychic warfare waged by those who presume they are the ones I am orienting towards.

    When you are on a stage, people presume they are mere observers, not participants. But what better position to observe than the stage? Just because you can be seen doesn’t mean you don’t also see.

    And conversely, just because you think you’re not “a performer” doesn’t mean you aren’t participating in reality with other people just as much as the person with the mic is.

    A lot of people live life under the illusion that they are tourists and the impact of their presence is both temporary and optional.

    Impact is inevitable, whether you grasp it and claim responsibility for it or not.

    Here’s an art piece I live painted at a collaborative streamed event last summer (2025) with some excellent local musicians and AV geeks in Bellingham. I won’t give too much away about the painting other than to say I was deeply present to the fact that though I was being watched, that didn’t mean I wasn’t watching back.

    As anyone with the courage to be visible does, I’ve dealt with a lot of rude folks presuming I am desperate for their (honestly, worthless) validation.

    I think in many ways that’s a form of the coward’s desperate grab for meaning. Instead of claiming their own expression, they try to claim authority over the substance of someone else, by positioning their opinion as necessary for the other person’s creations to mean something.

    BO-RING.

    Here’s a pic someone snapped of me live painting at the event I mentioned, fondly titled the DREAM STREAM.

    Whenever I am engaging in art, either as the creator or as the one getting to enjoy it, I like to ask myself, who really is the audience?

    Don’t get cocky thinking you always know the answer to that question.

    Peace,

    Adrien