Planet Paul

Not everyone makes it.

Maybe that’s good. Maybe not.

When I started this blog back 2010 my idea was to give as much coverage to artists, writers, musicians who hooked me. The artist Edward C. Zacharewicz hooked me. I found his paintings by chance on one late night surf of social media. I contacted him. We exchanged messages. We developed a rapport. The following interview came from there.

Planet Paul has always been a personal blog. I kept it going till around 2015 -16, when my commitments to Dangerous Minds, Flashbak, and a few other sites meant I didn’t get the time I needed to keep PP ticking over. I shut it down. Put it into hibernation.

Then in 2025, I decided to relaunch this site as an occasional blog which would slowly grow to something regular and hopefully successful. 

I deleted nearly all of my old content (pages are still available on the Internet Archive) but kept the interviews. What people do and what they think and how they produce their art, music, words, films is important to me. I will be republishing the interviews in an ad hoc basis starting with this interview with Edward C. Zacharewicz.

When we corresponded, Edward had not long reconnected with his career as an artist after a twenty year hiatus. He told me there were many reasons for this break. Life. Marriage. Family. Good things. He “wanted the white picket fence.” Time moved on. Things changed. But the need to paint was constant.

In 2009, Edward started painting again. He exhibited his work in galleries across New Jersey. He produced more and more paintings. He was experimenting, developing, progressing. Then in 2012, when things were looking good and Edward was close to having his work shown in New York, he died.  What could have been, we’ll never know. But what Edward left us, we should be grateful for.

The following comes from our interview first published in June 2010.

The artist, Edward C. Zacharewicz has a large collection of antique paintings and religious prints.  The collection is a reminder of the images from his childhood. These inspired him to start painting.

‘I was kid and going to Catholic Church with my parents and sitting there and just looking at the paintings and murals and how beautiful they were.’

It was the colours of the paintings – the bright flame of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, the royal blue on the dress of the Blessed Virgin Mary, the scourged body, the pierced side, the hues and textures of the crucified Messiah.

Colours were important even then. His parents bought him painting-by-number sets and Edward filled them diligently.

‘I always enjoyed colouring, still do. I actually didn’t start to draw until I was eight or nine years old.  I think it was working with colour that led me to paint in the style I do.

‘Colour can show much emotion without being in a physical form.’

Zacharewicz’s paintings distil experience into art.

When you look at a Zacharewicz, you can understand why his favourite painter is William Turner, the man he describes as ‘the master’.

Turner was the ‘painter of light’.  His work anticipated Impressionism, and his use of brush on canvas suggested elements of Abstract Art.

Zacharewicz creates layered puzzles which use layered colours to unlock their power and meaning.

‘All my paintings have to do with something from my life, a situation, a feeling, a thought, a person or place. I never decide, it just happens. I have a title for the work before I start.

‘I really don’t have a routine….sometimes I go weeks without painting, then all of a sudden I get this burst of wanting to paint…it might be a situation, it might be a spoken word.’

One of his paintings was inspired this way.

Edward C. Zacharewicz: It’s Not That Kind Of Party came from a conversation I was having with my friend Jessica Paris, who is the singer for Honey Spot Blvd.

I don’t even remember what we were talking about, but somehow what was said in the conversation and I told her I was going to use it as a title for a painting. The colours I used were based on her – bright, happy colours that work well with others.

Sometimes, it takes me days to finish a painting. Then there has been times were I have finished one in a few hours. It depends on the colours, if I want to blend them, layer them, or drag them.

I basically paint with acrylics, sometimes I do add oils to a painting because I love the texture it can give. Also on some I have used oil pastel crayons for a different look.

There are times when I look at a painting for a few hours figuring out if it is done or not. But, I always know when it is finished..

Why did you stop painting?

ECZ: I really don’t have a true answer for that, it just kind of happened. I went from painting then to drawing in a sketchpad, then to writing poems and lyrics. Also, I was working a lot so I actually didn’t have a fair amount of time to really concentrate on my art. But, I always kept notes about paintings that I would want to do when I did start again.

At the time of this interview, Edward’s work was in great demand.   He was talking to New York galleries and had plans for shows in Europe.  His work had also been used on the cover of a Honey Spot Blvd CD.

ECZ: They are a very talented band of musicians as well as wonderful friends and always very supportive of my art.

I recently finished a photo/painting project with an amazing photographer Kristine Diven.  We chose one of her self-portraits and I attached it to the canvas and did a painting around it. It really is a wonderful piece.

Edward was also working on a year-long project with West Coast artist Jeremy Guffey.

ECZ: Jeremy wrote a poem and sent it to me, we are each doing six different paintings inspired by the poem and not letting each other see them until the series is done, and that will be in finished in late October. Finally, I am trying my hand at using pastels and doing abstract landscape drawings and well as doing some photography.

Plans become memories. Too often forgotten.

I hope reposting this short interview with Edward C. Zacharewicz will rekindle an interest in his art.

All paintings © Edward C. Zacharewicz 2010-2011 – used by kind permission of the artist

This interview was originally posted in June 2010 on Planet Paul.

RIP ECZ.