The most recent painting, a tribute to one of my favorite musicians. And a much smaller painting than the “medium” sized, 4 feet by 3 feet size I’ve embraced in the last few years.
Definitely one of the most influential jazz musicians that ever walked on this Earth. Miles Davis was also in a league on his own as far as his overall style.
The way he dressed, for instance, was also unique, and just like his music, ahead of the times.
Untitled (Niki Lauda) Acrylic on Canvas, 48 x 36, 2025
As a young boy, I watched the horrific crash in the Nurburgring race track in Germany as it happened, live, on TV during the German GP of 1976.
Niki Lauda was the top Ferrari driver at that time, the reigning Formula 1 world champion.
The notoriously dangerous track was wet since it had been raining. Lauda’s Ferrari lost control, spun, hit the side rail and back to the track in flames and ended up getting hit by other cars unable to avoid him.
The sheer size of the circuit also meant that weather and track conditions around it could vary wildly with some sections dry and others wet, making a safe choice of tyres difficult or impossible.
He was seriously burned, but survived the accident and resumed racing that same year, once he recovered from his injuries.
This was the second tribute to a racing driver painting I made these past few weeks.
Untitled (Finestra Blu, Blue Window) Charcoal and Acrylic on Canvas 48 x 36 in 2024
I sat down at a local eatery and had in front of me this view behind two unoccupied tables. Perhaps it was the mundane quality of it, instead of the more important vase of flowers on top of the tables for instance. I created the sketch on location and at the time I knew I would eventually make a painting of it.
Title: Untitled (TAMALES) Charcoal and acrylic on canvas, 2022
According to Augusto, he was doodling with a vector program, and the process revealed the starting point for the drawing paintings.
“I was trying to make brushes, which I’d use to eventually draw with the brush tool…”
The first building block, the striped square in the image above.
After many different trials, Augusto decided on the composition in the image below.
He had to make additional custom forms, such as the corners, the only parts that aren’t made from the initial building block.
In the non-digital ( the image at the very top ), Augusto created the drawing layer using charcoal with a straight edge. The curved lines were hand drawn and sometimes they were re-drawn/erased multiple times until Augusto felt they were correct.
Vestiges of the mistakes, smudges, are not erased. They are the tracks left behind from the interaction with the surface as the drawing is created.
The lettering is stenciled using painter’s tape. It’s not a very efficient process, since the porosity of the canvas surface, and the relatively crude stencil. Each letter is painted separately, until it dries, then the tape is peeled off and the next letter is painted. It’s a time consuming and inefficient endeavor, but Augusto claims it is the method that provides the best results for him.
“If they were perfect or letterpress-like, then I would not enjoy the making of the painting nearly as much; and I do not believe the end result would be as appealing.”
