Nathan Stapley

"The Night Gallery"
11ft x 6ft
black and white acrylic gesso

"Here is a painting I did that was recently in a show at a gallery here in San Francisco called ARSPACE, run by a cool guy named Trevor. The show was based on an old TV show from the seventy's called Night Gallery. Rod Searling made that show, Rod Searling also made a show called The Twilight Zone, which is probably the best show in history next to Sesame Street, Pee Wee's Playhouse, and Kids Incorporated. Just kidding about that last one, Ha!

Each episode of The Night Gallery revolved around a painting somehow. Sometimes it seemed like Rod had to throw a painting in there somewhere just so the episode would make the cut, but in others the painting was almost the main character. It made for a great way to start an episode, Rod would stand there with his awesome 70's hair cut, hands crossed in front of his waist, talk about "grey hues of death" or some shit like that, and then pull the red blanket away from the painting and let the camera man zoom into it and than the episode would start, radical.

So as you can see I got pretty literal. I painted a gallery with paintings on the walls of some scenes from my favorite episodes. In that middle one; some mean, rich, blind lady paid Tom Bosley 9,000 dollars for his eyes, just so she could see for 11 hours, what a bitch! She got her come uppin's though, don't worry. The one on the right is about a rich dude who dies and his bratty half nephew or something tries to get his inheritance. It would have worked too if it wasn't for that crazy painting that kept on telling the future and making everyone have a heart attack, including Ozzie Davis(RIP). Roddy McDowell was in that one, and he is awesome. He also looks like my friend Paul Allen. The episode on the left was my favorite because Rod wrote it, and it's about a bunch of astronauts who think they are on the moon and talking to Huston and stuff, but it turns out they are actually on a huge piece of swiss cheese and they all get eaten by a big ass mouse in the end. Bummer!

The little people that are looking at the paintings are self portraits, you can tell because they are wearing the same shoes that I own."

By Nathan Stapley
www.nathanstapley.com

Nathan's work can be seen at the December 2007 small painting show @ Linc art. 100 or more small paintings

A few things about Nathan:
Your age? 33
Where you live/work? ocean beach san francisco
One thing that people don't know about you? my parents are mormon