Monsters Revitalize Thrifstore Paintings

The common saying ‘one man’s trash is another man’s treasure’ became quite apparent to Chris McMahon when he bought a landscape painting at an auction house for a dollar with the intent of repurposing the canvas and instead found another avenue for his artwork. McMahon says, “It had an ominous purpleness to it – somewhat moody, with mountains in the distance and a large, empty pool of water in the foreground. The landscape itself almost created a frame, the center of which, I felt, was notably absent a subject. So for the first time, I decided not to destroy a cheap landscape painting, but to finish it.” The result is a classic painting of a serene, mountainous background with a serpentine sea monster in it. These nearly discarded scenic landscape paintings are given a second life as McMahon tries to blend colors and match the original paint, such as acrylic or oil, to make it seem like the monster was always there. He calls the collection ‘Involuntary Collaborations’ as he, in a sense, felt that he was collaborating with the original artist to finish the painting and even signs his name beside theirs to give credit where credit is due. In our opinion, no man-cave should be without one.