They Said What?

  My last post attempted to describe where artist's ideas come from. I can only speak for myself, and I tried my best to describe the circus of lunacy that goes on in my head, but I feel like I didn't even scratch the surface. I had originally intended to make this part two, but another, hopefully better, idea came to me. I'm not a pretentious person, or a pompous artist, and I try to make my art accessible to everyone. Interpret it how you will. Hopefully it makes you think. Hopefully it makes your day a bit better. Sometimes, whoa, I get crazy responses to my art.
   My most misunderstood piece (if a fricking profile picture can be misunderstood, I mean some times I hear things and I think, okay, I can see that, but these are just way beyond the lunacy of my brain) is this one:

It's working title is "Kurt Cobain, The Thinker" because the face kinda reminded me of him and I had hope to come up with something earth shattering to replace this horrible working title. It's been almost twenty years, so any day now I expect it will come to me. Anyway, I've exhibited this one quite a few times. No worries. except for that first exhibition it was in. In Tremont, Ohio. They had (have?) art exhibited in all the neighborhood bars and restaurants. I was the king of Tremont for a while. I once had four exhibits in one month. I still had quite a few paintings left in my apartment. The exhibition in question was at the Arts & Cultural Festival. My pensive thinker took his place on my table. It was my first exhibition of these kinds of paintings, so it was really cool for me to see how the public reacted to my work. A lady walked up to me, eyed all my paintings, taking in the splendor, then walked over  in front of this one.
Lady:" Did you paint this?"
Me: "Yes, I did."
L:" It's good, I'm not just a fan of Bobby Kennedy"
Then she walked off. I laughed about that for a few minutes. I shared the story with my manager Shannon McGuire and we both laughed. Only minutes later we were approached by another potential art fan. He studied this one, gloriously lit by the Ohio sun. He scrunched his face up and asked me the question of all questions:
"Is that Bob Marley?"
My mind when completely blank. Fortunately my auto pilot took over.
"If you wanna buy it, you can say it's whoever you want it to be."
He seemed genuinely mystified by my answer. I lost several IQ points.

This next one elicited a response that took me hours to understand, days to wrap my head around it, and I'm still not over being pissed off about it. Here it is:

  It's called "The Sword" it's one of my favorite abstracts. It took a long time for it to tell me what it should look like. I tinkered and studied and sweated over this one. I made it work, and I'm mighty proud of it. I had just moved back to Cape Girardeau, Missouri to take care of my mom. I wasted no time checking in at the art's council, meeting the local business owners, finding places to hang my work.I got a call from the owners of an upscale restaurant. Fancy white table cloths, a different fork for everything, bottles of wine that cost more than I make in a week. The kind of place that doesn't let guys like me eat there (although to be honest, the owners and staff treated me well, it's just, you know, I prefer to eat somewhere I can draw on the place mats). I picked fifteen or so paintings to hang. My creme de la creme at that time. I'm no fool, despite what you may have heard. I'm gonna put my best artistic foot forward every time. After two or three days I get a call from the owner. Apologetic and uncomfortable all at once. Like the doctor talking to you right before the prostate exam.
Owner: " Hey, Doug, we need you to come switch out one of your paintings"
Me " What? Sure, okay. I'll be there in twenty minutes"
Owner:' Thank you. It's just we've had some complaints"
   I'm driving down there with a replacement painting, trying to think of which painting could possibly be so offensive it needed to be removed. I park. Go up the stairs, painting in had, and ask for the owner.
Me: " I got here as quickly as I could. Which painting do I need to take down?"
Owner:" This one" moving arm to this painting. My baby. The Sword.
Me: "Um, so, uh, what's the matter with it?" I really have no idea
Owner: " Well, some people were complaining about the Klan people in it"
Me: " The what?"
Owner: "The Klan people. Right there" pointing to the yellow beings with the red eyes. The ones I've always referred to as The Jawas. It's not what they are, just what they reminded me of. I left with my painting, unable to process any of what had transpired. The longer I thought about it, the more it pissed me off. The only way (IMHO) you're gonna see a klansman in this is if those idiots are riding around in your brain, I term I use loosely.

 Here's another. An abstract. Maybe there's a pattern here. I freaking love this painting:

"Make A Choice" It's a guy with his head propped on his hand,
 a long haired blond person from profile behind him. Over his other shoulder is the side view of a face. A stern visage if ever there was one. The other edge of the painting has a white shape. A wing. An angel's wing. Interpret how you'd like, but that's what it is. Exactly what it is. I painted it. I know. So, I'm pushing art though my Shopify store. I was running little five and ten dollar ads to promote it. I wasn't spending much, but I was getting good results. I submitted an ad with this as the picture. The next day a message informs me that the ad is rejected. The reason: nudity. I ask for a clarification and was told it was the naked breast in the middle that was the problem. I assume they're referring to the stern guy's nose. Later that same day I'm told this picture has been removed from Pinterest, For the same reason. Nasal nudity. Facebook never asked me to take the picture down. I just couldn't pay people to look at it. I guess. Pretty much the opposite of how porn works.