This painting is a portrait of my father James Johnston Shirk. He was a Op-Art painter. As you can imagine, he was, and is a big influence on my art. My parents divorced when I was very very young but I was able to visit his Manhattan studio during holidays and summer vacations.

The painting in the background is my representation of one of his paintings. He painted it in 1967 when I was 15 years old. It is oil on canvas, 72" x 48" and is called "Dance of the Iridium Atoms". I always loved this painting of his, but unfortunately I don't have a good photo of it to use as a reference for this portrait.



The image of Jim I used for this portrait is from when he was either in college or just out of college. At that time he was the illustrator for the Princeton Tiger magazine. That magazine is the second oldest college humor magazine in the United States, published by Princeton University undergraduates since 1882.



In the 60's and 70's as an Op-Art artist he was focused on color relationships. Here are a few examples of his work of that time.











You can learn more about my journey to Pointillism here.