The Los Angeles Blue Bum Paintings

"Reinvent Yourself." Aerosol Enamel and Latex on Masonite, 24" X 24"

"Big Questions" Aerosol Emamel and Latex on masonite, 24" X 24"

My current series of paintings, the L.A. Blue Bum series, evolved out of an ongoing project I started in 2007 in which I write haikus with a baseball (specifically Dodger baseball) theme and make a painting out of them for display in my front yard in Echo Park. Whereas the earlier pieces featured witty observations on America’s pastime, the newer paintings are far more complex, with layers of meaning for the viewer to discover. To symbolize the historical significance of the Los Angeles Dodgers, who are

"Upend The Shit You Know." Aerosol Enamel and Latex on masonite, 24" X 24"

struggling through difficult times right now because of the owners’ divorce and financial uncertainties, I have resurrected a character from the past, the Brooklyn Bum first illustrated by the great Willard Mullin. Just as Mullin’s Bum symbolized as well as satirized the boys from Brooklyn, my reincarnation of the character, the L.A. Blue Bum, roots for the boys in the Ravine while at the same time commenting with sometimes scathing candor on their follies and triumphs. But just as baseball, as American as apple Pie, has an ugly underbelly of drug use and greed, underlying the L.A. Blue Bum paintings are observations on the darker aspects of contemporary American society.

—>>> Go To the LA Blue Bum Website for more <<<—

Stephen Seemayer in his front yard displaying "Misanthropes 'R' Us". (Aerosol Enamel and Latex on masonite, 32" X 48")