s one can see, up to this point, my subjects have been mostly beautiful young men under 30. Johnson was an experiment in doing someone who in no way could be considered beautiful. The source photo is from the box for a PBS documentary called LBJ: An American Experience. The picture depicts Johnson with his chin in his chest, bowed under the immense weight of the Vietnam War. I hoped to not only reproduce this heavy sadness, but to accentuate it. To accomplish this, for the first time I worked on black paper, painting in the lights rather than the darks. Moreover, I resisted doing any blending or smoothing, leaving the stoney texture of the chalk. I consider this my most dramatic work. After completing it I quit painting entirely for nearly 2 years.