Paintings

For a long time I wondered: is it possible to balance creation with consumption? Or, more ambitious yet, can we create more than we consume?

The answer seemed like an obvious no, but a noble pursuit nonetheless. I tabled it as unanswerable. Then I co-founded SquadCast, building multiplayer software for podcasters and video creators, and an answer finally arrived:

You can create more than you consume by building tools for people to create.

Those tools are idea machines. Over a decade of building them, I came up with more than 20 startup ideas, killing all but the one that scaled. Somewhere along the way, I realized I'd become an idea machine too.

This collection flips that lens. After building the tools, now I paint them as what they are: utilitarian works of meta-art, art that makes art. By hand, edge to edge, at a scale that asks us to look closely: the iconic Teenage Engineering OP-1 synthesizer, Nintendo Game Boy Color, Sony’s original Walkman, the devices that taught a generation to create, play, and (dis)connect.

Each one is an idea someone made real, so others could make their own.

These are portraits of idea machines. What will you make?