The Story Behind Birds & Pair A Dice

I've always been drawn to the Bird of Paradise. Not the metaphor, the actual plant. It felt like it came from another planet, defying the rules of nature with its wild shape and unreasonably vibrant colors. I'd walk past one in a neighbor's yard in Los Angeles and stop every time, like it was daring me to explain it.

Then one day the phrase Birds & Pair A Dice floated into my head, fully formed, the way titles sometimes arrive before the image does. And with it came a whole scene: surreal birds, dice dangling from their beaks, circling a bloom that pulsed with life like it had its own heartbeat.

I started painting without overthinking it, which is usually when the best pieces happen. The colors bled into each other on purpose. The textures got a little chaotic. And the dice, once they showed up, wouldn't leave. Five for freedom. Nine for wisdom. I didn't plan that symbolism going in, but once it surfaced I couldn't unsee it, so I let it stay.

What started as a feeling about a strange, beautiful plant turned into a whole world. That's usually how it goes for me. I don't sit down with a thesis. I sit down with a color that won't stop bothering me, or a shape I saw somewhere and can't shake, and I follow it until it tells me what it's actually about.

People ask me sometimes why the birds are carrying dice instead of, say, flowers or twigs. Honestly, it's about risk. Freedom always comes with some risk attached, and wisdom is usually what you get after you've rolled the dice a few times and lived with the outcome. The birds aren't gambling recklessly. They're just moving through the world the way we all do, taking chances because staying still isn't really an option.

This piece has become one of the ones people respond to fastest when they see it in person. I think it's the color. It doesn't ask permission. It just shows up loud and asks you to feel something, whether that's joy, curiosity, or just a little bit of delighted confusion about why there are dice involved.

Birds & Pair A Dice is available now as a premium wooden framed print or as an unframed museum-quality print, both printed on archival paper built to last. If it grabs you the way that plant grabbed me, I hope it finds a wall in your home.