Allen Bunker Answers "4 Questions"
1. Your stories/memories are personal. What do you think about viewers
bringing their own interpretation to your paintings?
The whole point of my paintings are to draw people into them and remember those special times in their lives or to create new yearnings to go to ‘that place.’ I suppose I am trying trying to create a place of escape for my viewers. The paintings are seldom of a particular place but always based on the Maine coast.
2. How do you overcome creative blocks?
Every one of my paintings is a creative experiment. Every one of my paintings is a creative block that needs to be overcome. So the way I overcome creative blocks is to just keep painting.
3. What is your biggest inspiration?
My biggest inspirations are sales. Sales tell me I am creating something worthwhile.
4. How does your art affect other aspects of your life?
For years I have spent a lot of money remodeling houses. I have never taken the path that most do like just paint and paper remodeling. I have always reached past the simple profitable makeovers and tried to do the unusual. One of my barns had a 25’ ceiling in the entry made from 7x15” antique beams that I gleaned from the local ginger ale factory that was being torn down. It also had a heated brick floor and a brick wine cellar below that. When putting a dormer on my parents cape I couldn’t just do a normal dormer. The whole thing is a circle. I put a nail in the floor and all the walls are in a circular design 16’ from the nail. This takes a lot of time and money yet I feel to add the element of art is essential and worth all the effort.
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