Blood Lines

Salient Feature #2: Drawings in blood red scrawl. Pilgrims, witches, familial groupings, mohawked outsiders. A grim memorial to the colonial era, perhaps, or the evidence of a more contemporary communal, family, or personal trauma kept at bay through referencing a deep past. However, they convey sadness only retrospectively. In context, they are hopeful and welcoming if only because they punctuate the mostly fanciful interactions of this absent hand, and stand out from more typical trash. One thinks to unlock the mystery of their arrangements: big pilgrim, little pilgrim, big pilgrim, little pilgrim--nostalgia for parental guidance, regret as to its failure, or something darker? I don't think I want to consider the most representational aspect of this intervention as the cipher to a narrative . . . the "why" of this art. Not yet. If anything, like schizophrenic drawings--which they may very well be--they convey the energy and assurance of an alternative order (which distinguishes these from the drawings of children--who might not have the same sense of cosmology and purpose). I am always tempted to take one of these when they appear. They are the most "collectible" and most obvious sign of the artist. But I resist, even when I say to myself, "It's about to rain/snow anyway. This will be pulp by morning." Because, the more pulpy and damp they are, the better.

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