Why I’m Finally Letting Go of My Old Paintings

https://www.kenneymencher.com/

 Over the last few weeks—and especially today—I’ve been going through stacks of paintings that have been sitting in my studio and garage for decades. Work from graduate school, from my first teaching job in Texas, and from those early years when I was just starting to figure out what kind of artist I wanted to be.

Some of these pieces haven’t been seen by anyone but me. Others were shown once and then tucked away, wrapped in bubble wrap or stacked behind newer work. A few of them still have the frame I found at a thrift store and painted with black gesso to save money while trying to make it look presentable. Some are on scrap wood panels cut at the local lumber yard. I stretched a lot of the canvases myself, gessoed them on my kitchen table, and painted them while scraping by on a grad student budget.

Looking at them now, I realize I’ve kind of become my own best collector—which is both funny and maybe not great. I’ve held on to so many pieces thinking, “This one’s important,” or “Maybe I’ll show this later,” or “This needs to be part of some bigger thing.” But time passes, storage fills up, and eventually, you have to decide: Are you making work for yourself or are you willing to let others take part in the journey?

So I’ve started letting go.

1997, Val with a Guitar, 12.25x16 inches

Not because these works mean less to me—but because they’ve meant a lot for a long time, and it might be time to let someone else live with them. A lot of what I’m putting up for sale now are legacy pieces—paintings that mark specific times, places, and turning points. A portrait of Valerie in her favorite sweatshirt. A rooftop conversation. A remembered summer in New York. An expressionist figure painted out of frustration during grad school critiques. These are the paintings that built the foundation of who I am as an artist.

Many of these were influenced by painters I still admire deeply—John Singer Sargent, Malcolm Liepke, Lucian Freud, and especially the Bay Area Figurative group. I didn’t know it then, but those influences were creeping in even as I was still figuring out how to hold a brush the right way.

If you’ve collected my work before, this is a chance to own something from the very beginning. If you’re just getting to know it, this is a way to start with something raw, personal, and handmade—paintings that carry both the story and the process on their surface.

I’ll keep listing these older pieces in the coming weeks—some framed, some not, all signed and packed with care. You’ll see a lot of oil on panel or wood, sizes that aren’t always standard (because I didn’t know any better), and brushwork that ranges from tight to wild. Every one of them tells a story.

Thanks for taking a look—and for being part of this collection, in the truest sense of the word.

—Kenney

https://www.kenneymencher.com/