by Dennis Dalman
A silly so-called artwork, a “duct-taped banana” entitled “Comedian,” challenged/provoked 11-year-old Jaxx Hodge to make a better work of art one day in late May.
Inspired by the widespread attention that “conceptual” piece received, Jaxx decided to create an abstract work of art much better than a banana taped to a wall. When Jaxx’s father Jon learned of this plan, he attempted to gently ground Jaxx’s expectations, reminding Jaxx the joy of creation itself is more important than the reactions of others and explaining there are already thousands of unappreciated abstract works flooding the Internet.
But Jaxx disagreed. “I bet I can make something people will love. Dad, sometimes you just have to believe. You need optimism. That’s the only way to ever succeed at things.”
So Jaxx pondered for hours, gathered some acrylic paints, grabbed a 20-inch x 20-inch white canvas, and in a burst of inspiration, began to paint. Jaxx dubbed the finished painting “Optimism.”
On May 26, Jon uploaded the painting to “r/painting” for feedback, a 4.4-million member art community on the international Reddit website. Reddit is a giant user-run message board known as “the front page of the internet” where user-submitted posts are ranked by “up-votes” from more than 100-million daily visitors. Only the top-of-the-top posts ever end up making it to the main Reddit page.
Below the painting, Jon wrote a line asking “Redditors,” as they’re called, “My 11-year-old wants your feedback.”
Astonishment
Well, lo and behold, Jaxx and parents Jon and Amanda were astonished when “Optimism” jumped to number one on r/painting with 4.5 million views. It was an instant hit with Redditors (viewers).
Within just days “Optimism” had become the number-5 “top-viewed post” in r/painting’s history. That’s a major feat when one considers r/painting has existed for 15 years with an endless parade of portraits, landscapes and as Jon put it, “more than a few photorealistic cats.”
Jon added this: “Cracking the top-five of all time may have been a statistical lightning strike, but it’s the kind of lightning that can only strike if you first believe,” a statement echoing Jaxx’s brimming, fearless optimism.
Some viewers offered to buy the painting and/or support Jaxx by commissioning art works. In fact, Jaxx has since sold the painting to one Redditor and is now working on a sketch for a painting of a toy elephant commissioned by another Redditor to hang on the wall of a nursery.
During an interview with the Newsleaders, Jon and Jaxx ribbed one another about their disagreement on whether some abstract painting made by Jaxx had any realistic chance of breaking through like that duct-taped banana. Turns out Jaxx’s instincts and talent were right on. Jon, who admitted he knows little about art technically, chuckled good-naturedly, about how his hunch was wrong.
“Optimism”
Jaxx’s painting, “Optimism,” is a lively, whimsical, upbeat composition of streaks of colors (red, yellow, blue) and squiggles, plops and curvy lines of darkest black. It evokes a spontaneous expression of vigorous swirling movement and joyously explosive energy. The lightly dashed-on slashes of colors have, here and there, a scratchy texture showing the rapid brush strokes and the white canvas beneath them. The overall impression is one of rapid, interconnected, swirling motion – a dance-like improvisation of happiness and, yes, optimism.
Reddit Comments
The following are just a few of the multitude of comments made by Reddit viewers:
“Kiddo (Jaxx) is going to have his work in a gallery someday. Love it!”
“The kid is going places.”
“He seems to paint just for the joy of painting . . . He’s just doing what he loves. I believe he has a bright future in the art world, and I sincerely hope he never loses that joy!”
“It’s like smelling something that you feel like you know what it is but not quite. Or a song you hear passing by that hooks you, but you never hear it again and try so hard to remember it.”
Love of Art
Jaxx started having great fun with pencils, pens, markers and paints before he was 3 years old.
In art works, Jaxx likes to evoke an emotion, a feeling or an idea and most enjoys creating crafts and sketches, especially stylized sketches.
Last year, Jaxx the young artist was lucky to visit what is arguably the world’s greatest art museum, the vast Louvre in Paris. It’s home to what is arguably the world’s most famous painting, Leonardo DaVinci’s portrait of “Mona Lisa.”
Although only 11, Jaxx will be a seventh-grader next school year at Riverview Intermediate School. Jaxx was a precocious kid from Day One. Jaxx’s father described him this way:
“As the middle child of three, Jaxx is neither laid-back like older brother Grayson nor an orderly perfectionist like younger brother Charles . . . From the start, Jaxx was asserting willpower upon the world, using sign language at six months of age, walking at nine, scaling out of cribs at eleven, and making art, if you could call it that, from the moment Jaxx could hold a pencil . . . Jaxx started kindergarten a year early and shot right to the top.”
Jaxx wants to go to an art school and then study law and become a lawyer, like Jaxx’s father was for years in Chicago. Jon is currently a Director of Regulatory Policy and Customer Compliance for the St. Cloud-based Anderson Trucking Service. Jaxx’s mother Amanda is director of Youth Ministries at First United Methodist Church in Sartell.
(Editor’s note: For more about the duck-taped banana mentioned in this story, see Dennis Dalman’s column in this newspaper.)
Jaxx Hodge shows his abstract painting “Optimism” that made a huge splash on the Reddit internet site recently.
This ducked-tape banana by an Italian artist, dubbed “Comedian,” is what provoked 11-year-old Sartell artist Jaxx Hodge to make an abstract painting that people would love. He succeeded, and then some!