Here’s how eye-catching Nathan McKenney’s paintings are.
A Times Free Press photo taken in the home of a local artist and music impresario happened to have one of McKenney’s paintings visible on a nearby wall. Readers emailed and phoned the paper, pleading to know about the artist who created the cool painting which said “RIP Lou Reed” and “Candy Says,” an homage to the late Velvet Underground rocker who died in 2013.
“My Lou Reed was a completely different painting at the time,” McKenney says. When he heard the music legend had died, he simply painted over whatever he had on the canvas while listening to Reed’s “Candy Says” and “Coney Island Baby” for two days.
“Light as a Feather, Stiff as a Board” borrows its title from a popular preteen party game that involves “magic”. 
Sure, it’s a death’s skull topped with Calvary crosses. But it’s lit with a dazzling golden glow that branches out across the paint- ing, like a life force that fights back hard against the dark.“Musician names or lines from songs or even bits of quotes find their way into some of my pieces,” he says.
McKenney, 29, says his colorful, flamboyant work is influenced by psychedelic album art like the Beatles’ “Revolver” and satirical cartoonist David Shigley’s graffiti-like art and tattoo designs.