Of all my paintings, Three Fishes is the one people ask about most. They stand in front of it, they look at the three golden fish moving through the blue, and they ask, "Sam, why three? And why gold?" It is a fair question, and I love answering it, because this painting did not start as decoration. It started as a feeling I have carried since I was a boy in Egypt.
Water is life
I grew up around the Nile. In Egypt, water is not just water. Water is life itself. Where there is water, there is food, there is green, there is a future. Where there is no water, there is only sand and waiting. That lesson stays with you for life, even in California.
Fish are the promise inside the water. If you see fish, the river is alive. If the river is alive, your family will be alright. When I paint fish, I am not painting animals. I am painting that promise — life continuing, life providing, life moving forward even when the current is strong.
Why three fish?
One fish alone can look lonely. A school of twenty fish becomes a pattern, and the eye stops seeing individuals. Three is different. Three is a family. Three is past, present, and future swimming in the same water. Three is balance — not so few that you worry, not so many that you get lost.
In Three Fishes, the three golden forms swim together, close but not touching, each with its own light. I think about my own life that way. We move with the people we love, we share the same river, but each of us has to swim with our own strength. If you hang this painting in your home, I hope you see your own three in it — maybe you and two people you love, maybe three seasons of your life, maybe simply a reminder that you are not swimming alone.
Why gold, and why blue?
Gold is the sun on the water. It is also the color of value — not money value, but the value of something you protect. In my work gold keeps coming back: in Golden Face, 24 by 30 inches, where I tried to paint light itself on a human face, and in the Feet series, where Golden Foot is my own foot in 2026, lit by what I call the sun of modernity. Gold says: this matters, this is alive now.
The blue around the fish is deep water and also calm. I work a lot with blue — Blue Dream and Blue Staircase live in that same world. Blue cools a room down. It makes a big painting restful instead of loud. The gold needs the blue to shine, and the blue needs the gold to wake up. That push and pull is the whole painting.
Why 48 by 48 inches, on wood?
I chose 48 by 48 inches because this story needed room to swim. A small canvas would have made the fish feel like they were in a tank. At four feet by four feet, oil on wood panel, they have a real current around them. They can carry a living room wall above a sofa, or hold the end of a hallway, or be the first thing you see when you come home.
I painted it on wood panel, not canvas, on purpose. Wood is solid and still, like a riverbank. The oil sits on it with a different depth — the texture stays crisp, the gold holds its edge, and the panel will last. I sign every original because I expect it to outlive me and live in a family for a long time.
What I hope happens in your home
A living artist paints for living rooms, not just for storage. I am here, working in Riverside, California, and I paint so a work can live with you — morning coffee, evening light, guests asking about it the same way people ask me. Give a living artist a chance while he is alive, and the art lives with us, not after us.
If Three Fishes finds your wall, I hope it does quiet work every day: it reminds you the river is still moving, there is still life in the water, and your three — whoever they are — are swimming with you.
Looking for the right piece for your wall? Write to me at [email protected] — tell me about your room and I will help you find the painting that belongs there, and tell you the story behind it.