At War with God | 7-23-2026 | 12 x 36 in | acrylics and pigment ink on canvas
I’m so bored of explaining AT WAR WITH GOD.
It’s an absurd, amusing concept. If you believe in God, you believe he’s the all-powerful creator of all things. No one would GO TO WAR with something like that because you know you’d lose. Unless you’re fucking insane. In which case you’re probably not a functional human being with the discipline and organization to make a living as a full-time artist.
And yet people see this painting and get upset. Like it’s literal. Like I’m trying to RECRUIT THEIR CHILDREN AS FOOT SOLDIERS TO STORM THE GATES OF HEAVEN.
I don’t like authority. Words like “insubordinate” and “rebellion” are exciting to me. I like an underdog or a fun villain. And Leonardo is the worst ninja turtle. You know what makes for good characters? Flaws. God’s not interesting.
But when you make God relatable, bring him down to your level…
Cap’n Jazz sang “Hey, God – I dare you to SAY IT TO MY FACE?” Characterizing God as a petty coward who only talks his shit behind your back – SO MUCH FUN.
As much as I’d like to believe in God, I don’t. It’s just not in me. But it’s FUN TO PRETEND – to have him as a symbolic adversary.
The world’s never felt like it was designed for my success. Life’s often felt rigged against me. If God created this game I’m not meant to win, then every success is a skirmish I’ve won in my WAR WITH GOD.
Christians will say I’ve got it backward. My successes are God lifting me up.
Who cares?
Certainly not an all-knowing, all powerful God.
AJJ sang “My god thinks my jokes are funny.” Why wouldn’t he? Is God UPTIGHT? Is he too dull to have a sense of humor – or recognize when something is provocative but innocuous? Not a chance.
God’s benevolent. And a benevolent God doesn’t punish jokes or condemn his children to eternal suffering. And he certainly doesn’t condemn THIS CHILD.
Prices and availability of original paintings, giclées, and custom prints are available upon request. Some prints are available for purchase in the webstore. Check my calendar to see if I’m coming to your area anytime soon. Follow me on Instagram or TikTok for more regular updates (and nonsense). Subscribe to my newsletter if you want to get an email every month or so (whenever I finish a new painting).
D.L.A.T.Y.Y.C.K.Y.Y.T.C. | 5-24-2026 | acrylics and pigment ink on canvas | 24 x 30 in
I thought I’d be living at Tranquil Shores for at least another two months but when I went into the clinical office that morning, I found out I only had ten days before my discharge.
I felt shattered. Caught completely off-guard. I walked back to the residential property alone and remembered a conversation I’d had with my sister 18 months earlier.
I’d just been released from the hospital, following an attempted overdose. “You can’t kill yourself, Sam. That’s so selfish,” she told me.
Fuck you, I thought. “You know what’s really selfish, Racey? Expecting me to endure this kind of pain every day – to keep on with this shitty, empty life – devoid of any happiness whatsoever – so that you can call me on the phone two or three times a year.”
You wouldn’t be reading this right now if my life hadn’t EVENTUALLY IMPROVED, but – back then – my life hurt. Every day was painful. I felt isolated, hopelessly addicted to heroin, and lost. I could see no way out. It didn’t have to be that way, but I didn’t yet have the emotional tools I needed to do anything about it.
While I managed to turn my life around, some people suffer for decades on end. And as bitter and angry as I was when Racey said that to me, I’m still not sure we owe it to anyone else to stay stuck in a life like that.
That said – unless you’re in chronic pain or suffering from debilitating, UNABATING mental illness, you probably shouldn’t kill yourself. Not unless you’ve exhausted ALL other options. Because – as dark and miserable as life can be (and BELIEVE ME, I KNOW), it can also be pretty great.
If you’re truly ready to die, truly ready to give up on everything, then you’ve got nothing left to lose. So – before you kill yourself – lose it. Blow up your life before ending it. Choose uncertainty over unhappiness. Suicide is usually the consequence of feeling trapped. But you’re not trapped.
End the relationship. Quit your job. Break the lease. Disconnect your phone. Move across the country. Do whatever it takes to get out of your rut.
In my admittedly limited experience, when I make choices that demonstrate love (for myself and for others), things have a way of working out.
If all of this sounds impossible, I assure you: it’s easier than you think. If it sounds terrifying, do it anyway.
Worst case scenario: you were right, nothing gets better, and suicide is still an option.
DON’T LET ANYONE TELL YOU OTHERWISE.
But it’s not a very good option.
Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise.
This painting is what I call an UPCYCLE. I took the concept from one of my very early paintings and used it for this new one. The one I’m working on now is gonna be another one.
ON A RELATED NOTE, I’ve got three fairly recent paintings that I decided weren’t quite good enough. They were CLOSE but not quite. In the past, I believed in leaving each painting as a snapshot of where I was at right when I made it. Fuck that. I don’t wanna hang or sell something I’m not 100% proud of and happy with. So I went back to work on those three paintings and now I’m even more excited about them than I was when they were brand new.
Poor Forever | 10/12/25* | acrylic on canvas | 36x36"
Initially painted from August 31 to October 12, 2025, in Durham, NC; Augusta and Savannah, GA; and Oviedo, Largo, St Petersburg, and Lakeland, FL. Revisions / more painting in May 2026, in Louisville, KY.
Read about it in my blog entry for November 19, 2025.
Buy a signed, limited-edition 12x12" print in the webstore.
You'll Miss Me When I'm Gone (and Other Lies)
8-30-2025* | 36 x 48 in | acrylics and pigment ink on canvas
Painted in Tampa, St Petersburg, and Bradenton, FL; Savannah, GA; Columbia, SC; and Greensboro, NC, between June 27 and August 30, 2025. Additional text added in Tampa, FL and Spartanburg, SC on November 4 and 18, 2025. Major revisions on May 13, 2026.
Read its statement in the blog entry for November 24, 2025.
Signed limited-edition 16x12” prints may be available for purchase in the webstore.
Availability and prices of original paintings, giclées, and custom prints upon request.
The Boy Nobody Wanted Wins the Super Bowl
7-26-2024* | 36 x 36 in | acrylics and pigment ink on canvas
Originally started and "finished" in Sarasota, FL between July 7 and 26, 2024. "Finished" again in 2026 in Durham, NC on May 13 and AGAIN in Monroe, MI on June 19.
Read its statement in the blog entry for July 31, 2024.
Signed limited-edition 12x12” prints may be available for purchase in the webstore.
Availability and prices of original paintings, giclées, and custom prints upon request.
DLATYYCKYYTC is so titled as a nod to IYDKMRNIGE. I can rattle off either acronym LIKE IT’S NOTHIN’. (Yes, I’ve practiced).
Bad People | 5/14/26 | acrylic paint, staples, and safety pins on the charred remains of a painting destroyed by fire | 24 x 30 in
My RV, filled with art, burnt down in February. A friend joked: “HOW MUCH PERSONAL LORE CAN ONE PERSON DEVELOP?”
The fire was devastating but bad stuff happens to me a lot, so I’m WELL-TRAINED for this sorta thing. I’ve got TRAUMA EXPERIENCE.
Bad People is painted over the charred remains of Whole Wide World.
I haven’t always come out on top and sometimes it’s taken me years to recover, but the fire didn’t beat me. I was back on the road doing art shows that week.
In March, I was invited to some art fairs that were still 7 months away and given the option to pay the full registration cost or just a deposit. I’d have preferred to just pay in full and be done with it but I was scared.
WHO KNOWS IF I’LL EVEN MAKE IT THAT FAR? Maybe I won’t be making art by then. Maybe I’ll have lost everything. Maybe my life will be some kind of fucked up I can’t even predict.
I don’t really think that – I’m doing well lately and I feel SOLID AS FUCK. But it also feels a little myopic(?) to ignore my history. To not acknowledge it makes me feel self-conscious – like I’m failing to recognize what EVERYONE ELSE IS PROBABLY THINKING: “This won’t last. Sam can’t keep it together.”
Growing up, I never made it more than three years at one school. Same (to this day) with homes. And I’ve never held a job for even three months. (NOT THAT I WANT ONE).
I don’t even like to mention it anymore because I’m tired of it being such a big part of my identity but – until now – I’d never even made it two years off heroin (or fentanyl).
I’m extremely bright, extremely competent, and extremely UNSTABLE.
I could do ANYTHING – except for that instability. It’s made me kind of a fucking loser. At least at times. My life’s a lot of very impressive accomplishments and a lot of really pathetic, wasted years.
I’m self-absorbed. I think I’m sorta naturally inconsiderate. I’m prone to arrogance and kinda entitled. But I’m also sensitive, empathetic. I think I usually do the right thing, even if it’s not always my first instinct.
I don’t think I’m a bad person but does anyone really? I do think I’m sometimes bad at being a person. But I’m getting better. I’m trying anyway.
Before I transformed Wide World into Bad People, I made an entirely new painting (Fruit of the Poisonous Me) all about my experience of the fire.
I’d initially planned to do an entire series of new work on the charred remains of the paintings I lost in the fire. After processing everything through Fruit though – and now having done Bad People – I’m feeling like I’m sort of “over the fire” and ready to just move on. I still have those damaged paintings in storage though; maybe I’ll like the idea again by the time I get back to Florida. TIME WILL TELL.
Bad People sold on May 17, 2026. I’ve made prints but likely won’t add them to the webstore because I’m not sure I want the webstore to exist anymore. If you’d like one, your best bet is to COME FIND ME.
Fruit of the Poisonous Me | 13 April 2026 | acrylics and pigment ink on canvas | 40 x 60 in
January started well enough and then the ice storm canceled three events I’d booked in North Carolina. My next show was back in Florida. “Why’d I even leave?”
I decided to visit my brother in Durham.
February 1st – the night it happened, I was downstairs, gathering my things to go up to the guest room for the night. I heard an engine turning over.
“That sounds too close to the house to be a neighbor… Is someone trying to hotwire my bus?,” I thought.
I went to the window and saw the flames. I ran into the snow barefoot only to find the doors of the bus locked. I ran back in to grab my keys and shout to my sleeping brother, “MAX! I need the fire extinguisher now!”
One of my first thoughts was that Max and his wife were gonna be upset with me for this. I considered not even waking Max or asking for the fire extinguisher. But I was also hopeful that the fire could be contained and this might not wreck my entire life. Maybe I could even put it out in time to play it off like no big deal and that I was only asking for the extinguisher out of an abundance of caution.
That was not the case.
journal: Tuesday, February 3
The loss of my bus (my home) and my art are so devastating that it’s been way too easy for me to lose sight of…
HOW DEVASTATING THE LOSS OF EVERYTHING ELSE IS TOO.
Picking through the charred remains for anything that can be salvaged… – forget about the cost of replacing the bus or the fact that the art can’t be replaced. Virtually everything else I own… – it’s just death by a thousand cuts. I’m gonna be POOR FOREVER.
The fire may not have been my fault, but it’s all FRUIT OF THE POISONOUS TREE (me).
Well there’s the title and concept for a painting if ever there was one.
I’m gonna be fucking fine (or as “fine” as I’ve ever been). I get that. Even as I’m writing this all out. It’s just a low moment. But – fuck – this is all so much and it’s all so hard.
I had a thought that amused me. I played with the idea of adding it to the incinerated fragments of (what had once been) one of my paintings.
Have you ever fantasized about your home burning down, just to get a totally fresh start?
I USED TO.
Moments of bitter levity aside, I was overwhelmed. Everyone told me to take a minute. Collect myself. Not stress about pulling everything together in time to make it to the next show. I could miss one weekend they told me.
Nope.
I left my ashpile of a bus in NC and rented a van to get to Florida in time for the Downtown Sarasota Festival of the Arts. Late that night, a message popped up on the dash.
DRIVER ALERT WARNING REST SUGGESTED
I laughed to myself. “If I won’t take this advice from my loved ones, I’m certainly not taking it FROM A RENTED CARGO VAN.”
The concept of “pride”… I’m not a fan. There’s not much I’m proud of. But looking across my booth that weekend, I was kind of amazed. Yeah, my ProPanels smelled like burnt trash and Motivation and Luckiest Little Shit were smoke-damaged but fuck me if this set-up didn’t still look impressive. I snapped a photo to share online and captioned it:
If anyone was wondering WHETHER THAT FIRE COULD EAT MY DICK OR NOT – 4 days later, I’m 4 states away, doing the art festival I had booked AS PLANNED
I’m not proud of my clean time. I’m fucking forty. It’s embarrassing that I wasted so many years. I’m only sort of proud of my achievements within the scope of my art career. If I’d not been on drugs forever, I’d have done these things so much sooner. I’d be so much further by now.
But I was proud of this. To experience such loss and not let it slow me at all – it made me feel pretty resilient.
That said, I wondered how people online would respond to the news of the fire. How they’d react to what I was writing and saying about it on social media.
“Probably they’ll just think I’m an idiot, a loser, and that this is more of the same for me.”
“And they’ll probably think this is going to push me to start shooting up again.”
Oh… shit… “This is the first time since the fire that the concept of drugs has even crawled across my brain.”
That wouldn’t have been the case at any other point. Historically, the pattern’s been: (1) bad thing happens, (2) “I need to shoot up right now.”
I wouldn’t say I’m proud that I didn’t immediately fall apart and want to use, but I am pleased by it. That it was never even under consideration is strong evidence of my progress.
A few weeks later, I was driving, listening to the miserable, self-loathing songs that light up my little punk rock heart and a thought occurred to me: “I love this as much as I ever have, but do I still relate to it? Do these lyrics still describe how I feel?”
It was a major revelation. “Holy shit. For the first time in my life – I don’t think I hate myself anymore.”
“I think I actually even like myself. I like what I do. I like how I behave. And I really like what I make.” (Actually, I love what I make).
But FIRE ASIDE, things were going well. “Do I just feel good right now? Maybe my response to the fire was a fluke. If something else goes wrong, I might very quickly remember all the excellent and valid reasons to hate myself.”
I got an answer within minutes. Another driver flagged me down. Said the back corner of my new RV scuffed their car.
My license had just been canceled over some stupid paperwork shit from ten years ago. I’d already enlisted a lawyer to help sort it out but – on that day – I could not have cops show up. I could not have this going through my insurance. I was gonna have to pay these people.
I got the number a week or so later. They wanted $4,600.
I didn’t even know if I’d actually caused any damage, but I couldn’t take any chances. I paid the $4,600. It fucking STUNG.
But it didn’t make me hate myself. Almost the opposite? Even following THE TREMENDOUS HIT of the fire, I could afford this one too. That meant something.
I didn’t tell too many people about the settlement I’d paid. I was embarrassed even though I felt like the situation wasn’t my fault. Because it wasn’t random chance. A seed had been planted ten years ago when – detoxing from heroin – I’d taken too much Xanax, blacked out, and gotten charged with THREE SIMULTANEOUS DUIs. Now, that seed had BLOSSOMED into more poisonous fruit.
Journaling, I realized: I’ve always been very good at blaming myself (in a very childish, mostly meaningless sorta way) for anything bad that happened, but I don’t know that I was ever really able to accept responsibility. A lot of the most destructive “fires” in my life were more genuinely my fault than I’ve previously understood. And they shared a common spark – a subconscious core belief that the rules don’t apply to me, so I should be exempt from consequences.
I’ve had an Adderall prescription since I was a kid, but I was all over the country in 2014 and unable to refill it for a few months. When I dropped Abby off at rehab and she offered me her bottle of Adderall, it felt serendipitous.
Until they charged me with a felony for it.
A more reasonable person might have thought “it’s illegal for me to accept this.” I thought, “this is reasonable, I don’t care that it’s technically illegal.”
Sort of like how I continued to drive when my license was cancelled.
It shouldn’t have been canceled, so I shouldn’t have to stop driving – right?
I still don’t “respect” the law but I’m too old to think I can continue to break it and never suffer the consequences. Shit doesn’t work that way.
Maybe I’m not inherently (and irrevocably) poisonous. Maybe I just need to accept that I can’t always get special treatment. And maybe if I learn to accept responsibility when I break a rule, I’ll stop feeling like I’m to blame for the fires that weren’t my fault.
Or maybe not. I DON’T KNOW. This shit just happened. These thoughts are all FRESH FRUIT.
I’ve got upcoming shows in Myrtle Beach, Waynesville (NC), Atlanta, Raleigh, Roanoke, Crestwood (KY), Michigan (West Bloomfield, Cheboygan, and Ludington), St Louis, Chicago, Pittsburgh, and The Hamptons. At least one new show is usually added to the calendar each week, which you can check for more details.
I don’t think I’m going to use this site as a blog anymore. For more regular updates, follow me on Instagram or TikTok.
As summer crept up, I was not feeling so optimistic. I was thinking a lot about how I’d essentially lost all of my thirties to relapse. How even if my career was going well, it was not going anywhere near as well as it would be if I’d been at it all along.
I was thinking about how back in Round One,1 I was grateful for all of the tragedy and trauma in my life, grateful for my addiction and the time I’d lost to drugs — because all of that led me to art and a life that I enjoyed.
AND I WAS THINKING ABOUT THAT THING WE DON’T LIKE TO TALK ABOUT. And how it’s super fucking hard to be grateful for that. Because what did I get out of it? Eight years of relapse? Hurt, fear, distrust, resentment, and [insert OTHER BAD THINGS here]?
Looking back at my records, I’m kind of blown away by how well I did in those early months (and how quickly I started to take it for granted). The relapse may have cost me momentum, but wasn’t it still a minor miracle that I was able to pick back up as quickly as I did?
It didn’t feel that way. I was making money, but – even when I’m doing well – if I’m not hitting new benchmarks of success, I start to feel like I’m spinning my wheels. I crave constant progress.
I’d been commissioned to paint A CLOCK, so time was very much on my mind. I titled my clock “ALL THE TIME LOST” and journaled my pessimism into it.
Not everything needs a positive spin. Some things are JUST BAD. If you wanna believe there’s a lesson in everything – sure. But those lessons are not always worth their cost.
“Everything works out in the end. If it hasn’t worked out, it isn’t the end.”
Oh yeah? Works out for who? Innocent people spend decades in prison. Some people DIE YOUNG. Is death an example of shit “working out?” We’ve all got main character syndrome. Someone else’s death isn’t our life lesson.
“Everything will be okay in the end.”
The end is death. If everything is “okay” when you die, it just means “nothing matters when you’re dead.” And “if it doesn’t matter now, then it never really did.”2
It was totally obnoxious but I wound up in the same place I always do:
Any logical conversation about meaning ends at nihilism. So – UGGGGGHHHH – we’ve gotta make our own meaning and make the most of the time we still have left. As ANNOYING AS THAT IS. (‘Cause “for better or worse, someday this will all be over”).3
That was about as positive a conclusion as I could get to. I journaled some more, thinking about the kinds of art walks and street markets I’d been selling my prints at. I was making job money but not runaway success money.
Everything has an opportunity cost. Am I wasting time on “sustenance money” at the expense of higher risk, lower immediate-return efforts that could pay off bigger later? Am I inadvertently branding myself as a street-level artist when I wanna be in high-end galleries? I’ve only been clean 14 months. Am I impatient? How often should I be hitting major achievements?
And BECAUSE THEY’RE NEVER FAR FROM MY MIND…
Signed, limited-edition “classroom” sized clocks are available for purchase in the webstore.
As for girls, the current dearth of FRESH CANDIDATES actually has me reconsidering investing my time and energy into saving/repairing one that’s still broken.
I’m comfortable for now. I miss having a partner. If the rest of my life looked just like this but with a partner, I could be happy with that. But I’d like more.
By sometime in the fall, I had an epiphany: I was happier than I’d ever been. It occurred me that this was true even without a girlfriend. It had barely been a year since I’d been seeing someone but it was still the longest I’d ever gone. Was it possible my happiness was at least in part because I didn’t have a girlfriend?
I honestly can’t say but I do know it’s because (contrary to what I’d written) I did not go back to the girl I knew to be broken. And I didn’t go out with any other girls I met that weren’t emotionally where I needed them to be.
In the past, the moment I met a pretty girl that liked me, I was in. It didn’t matter if she was fucked up. I probably even liked it if she was a little fucked up. That was no longer true. I want someone who is both inspiring to and inspired by me. Someone who wants me but doesn’t need me.
I’m not gonna pretend that the song title “(Holy Shit (I Can’t Believe)) I Still Don’t Have a Girlfriend”4doesn’t regularly pop into my head. But lately I am hitting new benchmarks of success. AND I’M SO FUCKING BUSY EVERY DAY. Things are going really well and I don’t have the TIME to stress girls all that much.
Ever since the fire that burned down my bus/home, I’ve been hemorrhaging money. Luckily, I’ve also been making a lot of money. After getting ProPanels the last week of December, I started applying to “higher tier” events, like juried art festivals. I’ve been getting into most of them and it’s going well so far. This week though, I’ve got decisions coming in for six of them so CROSS YOUR FINGERS FOR ME. This week has the potential to make me feel like THE UNDISPUTED CHAMPION or to majorly bum me the fuck out. That said, I applied with a booth photo I took of my very first set-up (before I knew what I was doing) so… my future applications will be better. (That’s what I’ll tell myself anyway if things don’t go my way this week).
I don’t really use this “blog” for anything but adding art to the website and writing whatever’s on my mind right when I do that. If you want near-daily updates from me, I post all the time on TikTok, Instagram, and Facebook. There’s a bunch of stuff on there from the last month about THE FIRE, the new RV, the painting I’ve been working on for the last month, and lots of videos in which you can see how clever I think I am.
And check out the Events page. I’ve got stuff on there right now for the Carolinas, Atlanta, Kentucky, St Louis, Chicago, and I’ll add more as they’re confirmed.
Originally, they were all one large drawing, but I liked them better in smaller pieces so I cut the page up into four differently-sized segments.
Visually, they don’t look quite like anything else I’ve ever made. Part of that is because they’re ink, not paint, but there’s a reason they don’t even look like my other ink drawings. When I picked the drawing up and looked at the back of the paper, there was a ton of bleed-through – and it looked really cool. I liked the back of the paper better than the side I’d colored. So I flipped the paper over and redid all of the black outlines on that side. And then I wrote out all of my text. Which, in this one, says…
“You made it into my art. I guess you affected me. Just like you wanted.”
It’s about a girl I was dating pretty casually but who was really into the idea of getting me very emotionally invested in her – even though she wasn’t particularly invested in me. I imagine that had something to do with her bipolar disorder. In any case, as the drawing indicates, she did ultimately succeed in fucking with my emotional well-being.
BULLY FOR HER.
7×5-inch prints of “Just Like You Wanted” and the other drawings in this series are available in the webstore. Send a message for current availability of original drawings.
“Bubbles 2.0” | 1/29/26 | crayon and pigment ink on bristol | 8 x 6 in
From March 13th, 2013
In the last year, I learned to use art as a tool for emotional health. Since I’ve been out of treatment, I’ve been doing well in that area, but my counselor insists I still need to improve my social health.
One day, I accidentally went out to lunch with some people. I crept around until I found the restaurant’s stock of crayons and paper. I didn’t have anything in mind when I started (other than removing myself from the world around me so I wouldn’t have to interact awkwardly with other human beings) so I just chose a color that appealed to me and drew some shapes I liked. At some point, I decided what the shapes were, added to them to form the image of a kid blowing a bubble, and then captioned it with the first thing that came to mind.
This little drawing has no unique significance to me, but – like a lot of what I do – it’s evidence of how far I’ve come. Granted, one could suggest that – ideally – I wouldn’t feel the need to escape reality at all, but I think drawing is a big step up from shooting heroin. And – while I can see some validity to the opposing point of view – I don’t think social interaction is all that much more important than doing something that helps me feel productive and (in a very real sense) valuable.
For years, I’d wake up with a sigh, as I contemplated another day of being alive and – even worse – being me. Sometimes I create things that have a deeper meaning. Other times, I just draw little cartoons that I think are cute or clever and are little more than they appear. Both of these kinds of art are important because both are pieces of what makes me happy to be living and breathing as Sam North. A lot of people could do what I do, but a lot of people don’t. For whatever reason, I do – and that’s something I’ve been rewarded for in innumerable ways every day. What I once considered a terrible fate, I’m now incredibly grateful for. I’m pretty excited about being me.
From January 29th, 2026
The earlier (now retired) digitally manipulated print
When I first started making art, I didn’t know it was important to get good captures of my finished work. Getting a decent reproduction of “Bubbles” required digitally manipulating a blurry photo to the point that it didn’t really look like the original drawing anymore. I sold a bunch of “Bubbles” prints but it never sat right with me that they looked so different.
Lately, I’ve been more focused on presentation. That’s meant raising my own standards. To keep “Bubbles” in my print inventory, I’d have to redo it. So I traced the original photograph onto bristol, re-colored it with crayon, and did the outlines in pigment ink. Hence “Bubbles 2.0.”
