Most painting seems to use the painting as vehicle for other issues: socio-political on the general level and symbolic narratives on the personal. There is often a hackneyed painterliness which is used to signify authenticity or a deliberate nihilism to embody edginess. I don’t see much painting made which tackles the problems of painting itself in more complex ways. These problems will never go away: the simple act of putting the paint on in a way that is charged with the pressures of life yet not trying to illustrate facets of it is such a problematical and demanding pursuit (maybe a reason so few work on it). To put it bluntly: it’s easier to paint about something else rather than question how you are painting with the paint in the first place? Such an approach compels the artist to connect with the best of art, too. The reality of the painting is what stands the test of time rather than any subject matter that it is referred to. As the great nineteenth century painter Delacroix said: “what inspires the best artists, is not new ideas, but their obsession with the idea that what has already been said is still not enough.” Every moment of the making of a painting will provoke a question. How many can be asked and answered? The more that are, the richer the result.