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Nightmare For Sale: 1 Art Piece - Original Mixed-Medium - One of a kind - $600
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"Nightmare, a study"
This sculpture is based on a nightmare I had several years ago. The
canvas measures 24" x 33" with a tentacle reach of 15"(away from
wall). It is original mixed media, weighs about 12 lbs,and hangs on a
wall with any sturdy picture hanger. It is one of a kind. This
sculpture will make an excellent decoration for the Halloween season,
and is sure to make any party a hit. It was featured in The
Abattoir show in Columbus, OH last November 2007, and this past May in Columbus at MARcon 42 in
2008, both with rave reviews. The following text was offered in the
catalog of the show, as a description and explanation of the work.
"This was a piece I began in an attempt to explore the theme behind
the Abattoir show. I wanted to create something that would inspire a
visceral reaction from people, something that could really potentially
scare you. While working on it, I drew some of my imagery from familiar
sources who have already explored the concept extensively. From H. R.
Geiger's biomechanical monstrosities to Todd McFarland's "Spawn" and
"Venom" designs, H. P. Lovecraft's "Rats in the Walls" as well as most
of the Cthulu mythos, not to mention Johnen Vasquez with his "Johnny
the Homicidal Maniac". My personal imagery worked out of a nightmare
I'd had about a rip appearing in the fabric of reality, and escaping
from that rip was a formless black horribleness, embedded with teeth
and eyes that looked as if they should relate in space to something
that isn't there.
In terms of this sculpture's evolution, while working on it I
discovered that the parts which were scaring more that anything weren't
necessarily the teeth and eyes I initially envisioned. the action of
the tentacles, reaching out and grabbing - snapping like whips more
than teeth- started to become stronger until action became the major
focus. The nightmare had lost any anthropomorphic traits I thought it
might have in the beginning and became scarier the more it turned into
a formless Nothing. it was no longer something that related to
humanity, it became a lack of things instead; lack of color, light,
space, reason or sanity.
It was when it reached that point of "void" that I found the
sculpture to be truly disturbing. It reaches out and grabs at you in a
way I never could have planned, which I appreciate. Nightmares, unlike
dreams, are visions that tend to evolve on their own, despite our
wishes or intent."
Below is an interpretation of the original nightmare I had, as written by my wife.
I was in a dream, and in it there were
mobs of people panicking, running without direction, blindly feeling. I
was trying to find someone who could tell me what was going on, when I
came across a crowd. They were standing in what looked like a circle at
first and from where I stood, they seemed to be all staring at one
another in awe. I slowed down as i got to their perimeter, and tried to
walk around them on the outside.
As I walked around the circle, I saw that the people in the crowd
weren't staring at each other. they were staring at a point almost
directly above everyone's heads. There in the wind, shivering over the
crowd was something that looked like it shouldn't be there. A tear,
like a canvas ripped open by a jagged knife, had formed in the sky- but
it wasn't just the sky, it was tearing through something more
insubstantial, something more like atmosphere. If I looked directly at
it, I could make out what was on the other side of the tear, I could
see through the air that surrounded it, if slightly indistinctly. I
became one of those people standing there, staring. our mouths hung
open like guppies, but our ours betrayed the paralytic fear a possum
has for truck tires.
We watched the rip stretch itself, spreading along some invisible
tangent, taking pieces of clouds and sky and trees with it. We leaned
forward as one, wondering what was inside, and just as we held each
other on the brink, the Nightmare escaped.
It lunged through the tear at the crowd, itself a total absence of
light, color or any warmth. The people closest to the edge were grabbed
and sucked inside, screaming as the tar-colored hole absorbed them. It
began as bodies started to swarm backwards, people stepping on toes,
tripping over each other. Then a woman began to scream It was a
whining, keening scream; she must have been hysterical already. Her
howl fueled the crowd, and I among others started to climb anything in
front of us grabbing at hand holds where we could find them. Hair,
arms heads, tree limbs, anything was fair game in the attempt to get
further away from the blackness slithering its way out the torn canvas
of sky, following the scent of our terror at a dedicated pace. We
weren't about to outrun it; survival was now being categorized in terms
of seconds and minutes instead of hours and days. There was no time to
answer "what is it?" because there wasn't even time to ask the
question. In a matter of moments, my existence had been reduced to
giant clanging alarm bells going off all through my senses, and an
unshakable urge to run.
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