I returned to Philadelphia from Australia in 1993 where I had been living since graduate school. I began a series of large contemporary narrative paintings, all gouache painting on paper. As a young painter I wanted to make an equivalent of the illusive “great American novel” that so many young writers pursue.
“The Death of Eddie Polec…”, 1996–7, was the first and remains the largest of the 3, measuring 4 feet 9 inches tall and 14 feet 6 inches wide.
This work was inspired by the death of Eddie Polec, a teenager brutally killed by a gang of teenagers, his head beaten with bats against the steps of a church where years earlier Polec had been a choir boy. This work and several others were included in “Male Desire: The Homoerotic in American Art,” by Guggenheim Fellow Jonathan Weinberg, published in 2005, by H. N. Abrams in New York. Originally purchased by Dr. Bill Resnick, Los Angeles, “The Death of Eddie Polec…”, 1996–7, is part of the permanent collection of the Los Angeles Museum of Art. A portrait of Dr. Resnick standing in a hot tub is off to the right of the center.