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Spectral Light
8”x10” Giclee Print, an edition of 100, signed and numbered. Created for the 2025 Halloween Season. 100% cotton, MOAB, acid free and archival print. Bagged and boarded.
My mindset for the piece:
I am told my hobbies fail to be hobbies when I attempt to monetize them, so right now, my only hobby is looking for little flecks of light and levity when it seems the dimmer switch is on a downward trend, the bone-finger on said switch only knows one direction. And when I do find it, it’s a flash in the pan. Here and gone. Sometimes you only catch the fading, the traces; the warm leather of a now empty chair. The lingering smell of burning tallow in a dark kitchen. The perfume of stale beer and cigarettes and still echoing chatter of a party now only peopled by glasses left for a morning wash. The party is over, but in the hearth, under the soot, there’s still activity. Under the ashes of laughter and small-talk and good intentions and love and togetherness, the sharing of food and drink, there’s embers. And come first light when the rattling of an empty percolator announces your arrival, it takes only a negligible amount of fuel to resurrect the prior night’s plinth of warmth and light. Fire has always been a constant in Harvest festivals. An essential part of any festival, but for Halloween, it pushes back the coming dark half, illuminates the celebration marking the end of fieldwork and slaughter, moving on from a sun-baked, grueling hardship to a dark, cold, still grueling hardship, a beacon for those that went before.
Fireflies and a setting sun seemed like perfect way for me to get some of these ideas out of my head into ink. The dark half approaches, we light bonfires and make merry, we carry those coals to hearths and candles and lanterns and take that tiny bit of light off into the darkness, back to our corner, our community, and continue on. Not unlike a child with a firefly in a jar, called in at dusk, watching the flicker in a ball-jar as they drift off to sleep. A little fleck of warmth, safety and magic like a faceless, glass Jackolantern powered by a resource we’re quickly killing on all counts, the firefly and jackolantern both dead by morning.
Right now when I catch myself being festive, jolly, it’s immediately marred by guilt. The things I want to celebrate are so basic and pure, and so many aren’t afforded even that. We have so much and care so little. The curtain is coming down and I can’t help but feel we’re all polishing brass on the Titanic. If you happen to find an abundance of warmth and laughter, if you have light to spare, please, have your fill and send the rest far and wide. So much rarer, priceless a resource now when the dark half approaches and we’ve kicked away from any sort of cycle or calendar that might bring back the sun, a thaw, a more abundant era. I hope the bed of embers we lay, for burning too bright and quite frankly, carelessly, lay slumbering just under the soot so after we’re gone, it only takes the smallest amount of dead growth to refuel the blaze. And friend; we’re all dead growth.
8”x10” Giclee Print, an edition of 100, signed and numbered. Created for the 2025 Halloween Season. 100% cotton, MOAB, acid free and archival print. Bagged and boarded.
My mindset for the piece:
I am told my hobbies fail to be hobbies when I attempt to monetize them, so right now, my only hobby is looking for little flecks of light and levity when it seems the dimmer switch is on a downward trend, the bone-finger on said switch only knows one direction. And when I do find it, it’s a flash in the pan. Here and gone. Sometimes you only catch the fading, the traces; the warm leather of a now empty chair. The lingering smell of burning tallow in a dark kitchen. The perfume of stale beer and cigarettes and still echoing chatter of a party now only peopled by glasses left for a morning wash. The party is over, but in the hearth, under the soot, there’s still activity. Under the ashes of laughter and small-talk and good intentions and love and togetherness, the sharing of food and drink, there’s embers. And come first light when the rattling of an empty percolator announces your arrival, it takes only a negligible amount of fuel to resurrect the prior night’s plinth of warmth and light. Fire has always been a constant in Harvest festivals. An essential part of any festival, but for Halloween, it pushes back the coming dark half, illuminates the celebration marking the end of fieldwork and slaughter, moving on from a sun-baked, grueling hardship to a dark, cold, still grueling hardship, a beacon for those that went before.
Fireflies and a setting sun seemed like perfect way for me to get some of these ideas out of my head into ink. The dark half approaches, we light bonfires and make merry, we carry those coals to hearths and candles and lanterns and take that tiny bit of light off into the darkness, back to our corner, our community, and continue on. Not unlike a child with a firefly in a jar, called in at dusk, watching the flicker in a ball-jar as they drift off to sleep. A little fleck of warmth, safety and magic like a faceless, glass Jackolantern powered by a resource we’re quickly killing on all counts, the firefly and jackolantern both dead by morning.
Right now when I catch myself being festive, jolly, it’s immediately marred by guilt. The things I want to celebrate are so basic and pure, and so many aren’t afforded even that. We have so much and care so little. The curtain is coming down and I can’t help but feel we’re all polishing brass on the Titanic. If you happen to find an abundance of warmth and laughter, if you have light to spare, please, have your fill and send the rest far and wide. So much rarer, priceless a resource now when the dark half approaches and we’ve kicked away from any sort of cycle or calendar that might bring back the sun, a thaw, a more abundant era. I hope the bed of embers we lay, for burning too bright and quite frankly, carelessly, lay slumbering just under the soot so after we’re gone, it only takes the smallest amount of dead growth to refuel the blaze. And friend; we’re all dead growth.