dead bodies

CRIME SCENE CHALK OUTLINES.....

Something from Nothing. A beginning. Preparation. Getting ready for anything - marriage, a date, lovemaking, kid's first day at school, last days of cancer, a first kiss- all the same. Peel the onion. It is about stripping things away rather than putting things on. Peel the onion down to a sweet spot. A spot where you reveal whats already there. Sure, an artist can choose from a plethora of materials, but the beginning of making something from nothing is the process of eliminating the colors one doesn't need. Michaelangelo felt that he just chipped away at the outer shell of the hunk of marble to reveal the body locked inside. I am not Michaelangelo, but I agree. I am not precious about how and when I apply gesso, or at what temperature, or how to sand it down by moonlight before the summer solstice. No. Lay that canvas out flat on the ground, not precariously perched on an easel. Scrape, rub, and scratch. Ridges, dimples, and craters happen. Gesso dust, art cocaine, and homeless clouds of truth and edges. Lift the canvas like an ascension and what's left? Dust settles down to the hard lines of the shape that was just made. What was already there to be revealed. A broad piece of blank hope. The white chalky outline whispers an imaginary vanishing tale, a potential crime scene, of the unknown, unseen process of creating something from nothing. A blank canvas. Now what.