"Evil Don't Look Like Anything"

Negotiating Safe Passage, 36x36", oil on canvas, 2007

 Last night at dinner Ramona brought up the idea of inherited guilt. She was writing an essay for school. She, in all her youth and innocence, was wondering at the idea of original sin or inherited sin. Brian and I brought up the idea of collective guilt and collective consciousness using slavery as an example here in the states and we also brought up Nazi Germany. She wasn't having it. Why should anyone feel guilty for what they didn't actually do? We talked about the guilt we feel about the advantages we've had because we are white, our parents are white---about the positive projections of advancement, expectations of success, we've inherited. These things were hard to pin down with examples....Brian talked about the economic advantage the early United Stated enjoyed because a large amount of our industry---agriculture particularly, was built with the free labor of slavery--wealth built on slavery, not freedom. And how a parent's advantages and limits are potentially passed on to their kids. 

 All this got me to thinking about guilt, temptations, purity of good and purity of evil. I don't happen to believe that there is such a thing as pure evil or pure goodness. I believe it's far more interesting than that. I try to go good things, strive to be kind, but I am fascinated with evil. And experience in life has taught me that that struggle is where wisdom is gained. So in my work as an artist I use the allegory of nature to show the ambiguity of beauty in humankind. There is, always, in my pieces, an element of sadness and wonder, at the beauty of things both evil and good. Nature is a formidable force of goodness in life. It can also be horribly destructive and destroy lives. One should never turn their back on nature. Keep it close and watch it. But remember, "evil don't look like anything."

Evil is an act.

Here's one of my first, favorite, Okkervil River songs...It really says it better than I can.