These mixed media works are executed in gouache, ink and textured papers.
The subjects are of people who share one common thread. They were in desperate need of hope during extremely difficult times.
Artistically, the task is to translate their reactions at the very moment their hope arrives.
There are many historical accounts of people in hardship or in lack and of the noble souls who met their needs. Countless more that history never heard of and there are those we possibly know from our own experiences.
I chose 1st Century Galille and Judea as the backdrop for these pieces.
The historian, Flavius Josephus recorded the hostility that surrounded the people of the times in his writings. He also mentions Jesus of Nazareth as a healer amongst other detailed references.
Most modern scholars agree on at least one of the accounts Josephus attributes to a historical Jesus, referring to James, the brother of Jesus. “So he (Albinus) assembled the Sanhedrin of judges, and brought before them the brother of Jesus who was called Christ, whose name was James: and some others; [or, some of his companions.] (1)
For these particular works, I found that Jesus of Nazareth, as recorded in the Gospels of the New Testament was ideal. He was an individual who encountered many hopeless and desperate people whether poor or rich during extremely oppressive times.
These works are about those particular people and their experiences, and in a way about others like them, even us, who found hope and help from a total stranger.
The Gospel accounts give enough details about each one of these people.
Was despair overcoming them?
Were they experiencing a deep sense of alienation?
Did they completely abandon the help or answers upon arrival because they were not capable of receiving it?
What about their struggles, their sufferings, their unanswered questions?
Would they experience any deliverance or reprieve and quench their longing for some individual peace?
All of these people had experienced one or more of these afflictions.
How would they even look and react when that help and hope finally came around?
Caring
“Arise, take up Thy Bed, and Walk.” 2022
Sacrifice
Simon of Cyrene Bearing Jesus’s Cross 81st Audubon Artists Exhibition, 2023 Online
Compassion
“Go wash in the pool of Siloam.” 81st Audubon Artists Exhibition, 2022 Online
Fulfillment
“The woman said, …When Messiah comes he will tell us all things.” “Jesus said to her, I who speak to you am he.” 2024
Mourning
“Woman, why are you weeping? Whom are you seeking.” 2023
Sympathy
“And looking up to heaven, Jesus sighed, and said unto the man, ‘Ephphatha,’ that is, Be opened.” 2024
Flavius Josephus, Antiquities of the Jews
(1) Book 20 Chapter 9
REF: https://penelope.uchicago.edu/josephus/ant-20.html