Guitar and Banjo with Chili Pepper Lights 18 x 24 inches, oil on canvas. Completed August 2005. Original Sold.

The setting is my living room. My partner's guitar and my banjo, neither of which I play. I got the banjo for Christmas some years ago, and never took to playing it with the same ease I took to art. But the banjo is such a beautiful instrument in itself that I wanted to portray it somehow - if I can't play it then I can paint it.

The guitar is named Charley Johnson. It's a Johnson guitar I bought it for my partner for her birthday August 13, 2004 - the same day Hurricane Charley hit. We were in St Augustine searching for an open music store, and finally found it in a pawn shop because all the shops were closed.

Two weeks before beginning this painting, I sat in front of Christopher Columbus by Salvador Dali in the Dali Museum in St Petersburg, FL, in awe of the skill and technique of such a master. It was Gala's robe that captivated me and what I had in mind when I set up the objects for the still life.