In early 2015, I made a little doodle on a scrap of paper (above left). It was a picture of boy wearing a hoodie that had just pulled a pin on a grenade. I thought of him as Icarus Elck, a character I created. You can read about him here 🌪️🌪️🌪️. Even though it was not a very good drawing, there was something about it I liked. So I scanned it and began drawing on it with my 13" Wacom Cyntiq using Photoshop. I took some reference pictures of myself in the same pose (see above lower right).
I was not happy with the drawing of the butterfly, so I removed it. This first image represented the will to act.
I wanted the hoodie character to be an "Everyman" or everyone (androgynous) character. I integrated the Leonardo Study Of An Angel into my drawing. For me, that angel represented the feminine aspect of the character as well as suggested that this person was not just simply evil and/or malevolent.
I slowly introduced color.
Despite the comment above, I was jokingly calling this character the Unabomber because when I wore a hoodie and sunglasses, I resembled the UNABOMBER sketch.
I wanted to emphasize the character's psychological turmoil so layered the image with a tornado painting I had done (Above right).
Then I reintroduced the butterfly. For me, the butterfly represents the liminal space between idea and action. It is the pause for reflection and is the conscious moment of awareness. It is also the symbol of transformation and, obviously refers to the title The Butterfly Effect.
I worked on several more images in which I tried to really exaggerate the severity of the psychological turmoil Icarus Elck was experiencing. I was getting frustrated with this series and the world around me.
At the time I was making the version above, I was seriously questioning the sanity of about half of my fellow Americans. In 2015 and 2016 I was not able or even willing to try to understand their motivations and actions. The color in the image above represents that overwhelming anger and rage.
I felt like there was a beast welling up inside of me, and I digitally modified an acrylic painting of mine called Acceptance (pictured above left), to represent that idea. Acceptance reminded me of the parasitoid stage of the xenomorph in the movie Alien. It also reminded me of the red knight in the movie The Fisher King and the vagina dentata in the movie Teeth.
As women marched on Washington, I imagined a grenade exploding into millions of butterflies with razor blade wings. I wanted to create a beautiful explosion and stumbled onto the effect pictured above left by inverting the butterfly wing layer, which made it almost unrecognizable. The image above right is that same layer switched back to normal.
I taught myself to use Photoshop and frequently have students tell me “You know that there is an easier way to do that right?”. But I just play around until I get the effect I want or stumble onto something better.
In the image above I was trying to digitally destroy part of the image when I accidentally used the sharpen tool too many times. The effect was hideous but interesting, so I kept doing it - for about a half an hour. Really. The right hand side of the image above was the result.
I then inverted the image to explore the idea of a literal visual opposite.
One day, I happened to turn off a layer and, forgetting the Acceptance image was in the stack, produced the image above. That little "accident" took me in a direction I had not intended. The new shape had become a "headdress" or mask through which my character experienced the world.
I spent a lot of time separating the “Beast Priest” from the background and the image above is the point at which I realized I had forgotten about the grenade.
In most of my images, I work intuitively and spontaneously like doodling. For some reason I decided that the grenade was just gone and the hand would be on fire.
I used the sketchbook image (above left) as the starting point for the hand.
I digitally painted it. Click the image above to see the painted hand without fire and the right hand image with fire.
I placed skeletons like the ones above inside the body of the Beast Priest.
I finished this image, but realized that as a series, these images did not flow in a logical manner.
My mother died December 23, 2016. You know what happened after that. The next 4 years were insane and I worked very little on these. Then Covid happened, my father died August 15, 2020, the Capitol was attacked, and finally, my marriage unraveled and I was divorced July 11, 2023.
Exactly one year later, I decided to find the grenade.
The creation of anything implies that there was an impetus or problem. Why would you make anything (a song, a law, a spaceship, a Mr. Potato Head Doll, even a doodle), if there was no cause.
I am trying to understand my place in this crazy world, and the images I create are my way of thinking through making instead of thinking through words in my head.
When I began this image, I thought I knew what it was about. I would tell people that Icarus Elck represented each of us. Icarus is the fallen son. In Dutch Elck means 'each' or 'everyone'. In the christian world view, which we have inherited, we are each fallen man.
I would say that the butterfly represents a moment of clarity. The butterfly is an awakening. The butterfly is a full stop. Stop what you are doing. Stop what you are obsessing about. The butterfly represents change. The butterfly is the point of no return.
Do we blow ourselves up, or do we put the pin back in the grenade?
After many years of thinking about this (because I am a bit slow), I cannot honestly say that this image represents everyone. I could not possibly know what anyone else really thinks.
This series of images represents me. I am Icarus Elck. I am the fallen son. I am just another human being like you (I hope : ).
And the grenade? It was not for destroying others. The grenade was meant for me. And that is the what the painting below represents.
I AM THE PHOENIX
