Artist Reply: Thank you. I wish it was a painting. It is actually an accident. It is a photo of a part of a piece of equipment called a "blowout preventer", which is a big steel block that sits on top of an oil well at the bottom of the ocean. If a surge of gas comes up the well, two large rams thrust forward, cutting the drill pipe and sealing the well in order to prevent a huge mess. The two big round things in the middle right are very large socket screws, about 2" in diameter. The black part in the middle is a rubber seal, and the rest are various pieces of nasty, greasy steel. I was taking photos to document a test, and the part was sitting outside in the rain. When I downloaded the picture, I was amazed at the (totally accidental) composition. I keep meaning to try some abstractions of it, either digitally or in colored pencil.