From the Wood with Love
Art in October
My recent charcoal collection was inspired by the striking driftwood landscaping at Horseshoe Bay Resort. I became captivated by the dynamic movement preserved in the old wood. Within each curve, weathered face, and twisted root lies a narrative—a dance, a melancholy reflection, or a quiet celebration. As I wandered around the grounds, I allowed these old woods to speak to me. These drawings stand as the tangible impressions of those silent, inspirational whispers. —Jim
The Story Teller. Charcoal on Paper
In this ongoing body of work, I return to driftwood as a recurring visual motif—drawn to its quiet resilience, its organic anatomy, and the harmony found in how nature sculpts matter through friction, water, and time. Rather than rendering literal botanical studies, I approach these weathered fragments through biomorphic abstraction, using their twisting, striated forms as metaphors for the human condition. Just as tides and wind carve deep grain into fallen wood, lived experience—our hopes, losses, memories, and quiet endurance—shapes who we are and who we become.
Charcoal is essential to bringing that metaphor to life. Because charcoal is itself transformed wood, the medium shares an elemental kinship with my subject. Pushing charcoal across its full value scale allows me to balance physical permanence with emotional vulnerability. I anchor each composition in dense, velvety blacks and crisp reductive highlights that articulate the rugged, scarred texture of survival, while letting the edges dissolve into translucent washes, sfumato, and delicate, thread-like lines
Across the series, each piece isolates a distinct facet of our inner landscape. In Wishbone Cradle, interlocking, bone-like branches arch around a fragile pocket of negative space, creating a protective vessel for the turbulent vulnerability of hope, doubt, and everyday ritual. In Storyteller, wave-like roots unravel upward into fine, ink-like tendrils, capturing how family lore, shared myths, and intuition seep into everything we do. Together, these works stand as quiet monuments to resilience—honoring the strength and grace carved into us by the very forces we weather.
Ballet in Wood. Charcoal on paper. Jim Keating
Untitled. Charcoal and Pencil on paper
Wishbone Cradle, Charcoal on Paper 2026
Prints available in store
Well hello there! Welcome to everything I am currently working on including the projects in the faraway, distant lands known as the Back-burner Badlands*. I would love to give you all some sort of Calendar where I could list all the dates I expect to have these projects completed but every time I’ve done that in the past Life has given me a reminder about who laughs when we make plans.
Have fun looking through the few pieces of my imagination I was able to put down on paper, computer, back of an envelope and whatever else I scribbled on when inspiration hit. If there is any one of these projects you would like more information on please feel free to e-mail me with any questions.
The Listening Heart is a project I’ve been carrying around for a long, long time. First, I have to applaud the characters who have been patiently waiting in my imagination for so long—thank you all for sticking around.
After a few false starts back when I was working entirely in traditional media, I decided to shelf the project because of the extremely daunting logistics of publishing a book. I didn’t have a computer, nor did I have the agency to carry out a project that I thought would take me a year to finish without a clear end in sight. But after putting a few thousand miles on my publishing shoes, I felt confident enough to dust off The Listening Heart and put it out into the world.
In the beginning, when the ideas for the book were just little sparks of possibilities floating around in my imagination, I felt like there was a story here that truly needed to be told. I’ve been inspired by so many people, places, and things in my life, but this story definitely touched on some very specific memories.
The first time I went to New York was mind-blowing—especially for an eight-year-old. I feel like that trip, which was only a couple of weeks, filled years in my head. The trains, museums, crowds, zoo, Coney Island, Chinatown, Broadway, and Central Park were breathtaking! And the sounds were amazing and everywhere. There was no quiet; even the museums were noisy.
Every time I thought of the little girl in the story (who didn’t have a name until I met a friend's daughter—you know who you are!), I thought of New York and the huge impact it had on me. I knew there would be a place for the city's influence in this story. But I also wanted it to have a singular, fantastic element that would embody all my experiences of New York alongside another city I fell in love with much later: Austin, Texas.
You can read the full story and access everything in the Listening Heart Studio on my Patreon page. Become a member and, in doing so, you become a part of this book and its journey into the world!
.
