My Art work develops every time I screw up literally, on paper and in Life. I develop new Technique by trying all forms of Art, different styles. And if I see a Art piece that is mind blowing and looks difficult to draw, I’ll put it to the test. Thats how I progress. I learn from every Artist, and if you created it your self, it is never wrong, nor could ever be wrong. for you are the creator no matter what anyone says. I never really knew what inspired me to draw. Besides the love I have for Art. period. My oldest brother Jessie taught me Art as a kid. Money was tight growing up, we were poor. So when toys where not gifts it was coloring books and color pencils. I remember drawing a shark one day on the dinner table, my brother walk up behind me and seen the shark, he told me “Thats badass, but you can do better I know you can, let me show you.” Instead of my straight shark that looked stiff and stale. He showed me how to open the mouth and show teeth, how to curve the tale in a swimming motion. I was amazed of how easy I could have done that, but didnt think to do so. He says to me “there, now it looks alive, give it a try.” I’ve never brought this up to him, but from that day forward every Art work I have done had to look alive, I was in 5th grade when this accured. He is a Art teacher now, and so am I, but in prison, I thank him for this gift. About 5, months ago I drew a portrait for someones family. I was in the shu, lock up. This friend of mine wrote me a kite and This kite has given me my inspiration for Art today. It said “you have a gift, you don’t belong in prison with this talent, Always remember your Art work will be around forever even after your gone, and that right there is priceless.” These words have become my inspiration, I’ve never bothered to look at my Art work in that way, until now. And this was only 5 months ago, I’ve been drawing my whole life.
My friends Sophia, Snow, and I at JAC were talking about this image, and we wanted to send you our notes. I hope you have already received Kiesa’s response. I think for all of us, it’s very difficult to piece together the various elements of the past and present.
That’s what moved us so much about this picture; how it describes a brave attempt to make sense of all those elements. There’s even a hand — presumably the artist’s hand — appearing on the left, putting life’s puzzle together. Where to begin in this fragmented, often senseless-seeming world when one eye is only an empty socket? Though hardly seen through rose-colored glasses, the rosy, smiling images surfaced from the past — an idealized past. The words STATE RAISED and I LOVE YOU, MOM, are just one of many ironies that permeated the work, stripping it of sentimentality. Another is the Dad who died young, and the wish that he could have been more present and helpful juxtaposed with the man at the bottom kissing his baby.
There’s a powerful diagonal connection between the plumed warrior — half skull, half-flesh — and the woman with the close-cropped hair. Both figures have facial scarifications and relationships to the rosy figures beside and beneath them. Somehow they have emerged from the orgy of violence and suffering in the background, tightly packed, like Bosch’s version of hell: there’s a Martian, a spread-eagled octopus woman, a man split in half devoured by a snake.
To relieve intense emotions around this scene and give it some dimension — some hopefulness — some divine energy — there is an opening to the moon and stars in the upper left and a pair of vaults at the bottom. Here there is infinite space, in contrast to the tightly-packed puzzle pieces of past and present — excuse the alliteration; it just came out. The main thing, though, is how much we were moved by our empathy with the characters and the artist’s dedication to puzzling them out. This act of courage invited us to make sense of our own lives, our connections to ourselves and each other. Thank you for making this happen. We will remember it long into the future.
Sophia, Snow, and Louis