STUPID FANTASIES is a painting that attempts to address the nature of desire by way of the shopping mall and consumerism. Here, the shopping mall stands in as a surrogate for unfulfilled metaphysical desires – love, comfort, success, wonderment, or spiritual connectedness. By examining the mall’s emotional and psychological effect on its patrons, I want to demonstrate that there is more at work here than mindless, shallow consumerism.

My intentions here are two-fold: to open a dialogue with my peers about what, if anything, is absent or disappearing from our culture than manifests itself in compulsive shopping, and to oppose a kind of dismissive or dogmatic way of thinking that suggests that certain topics are “stupid,” and therefore unworthy of thoughtful discourse.