Painting: Man's Compromise

Man's Compromise.  Acrylic and a variety of natural and man-made stuff.  2004

Acrylic on wood.
(sorry photo is blurry; is only original one I have)

Acrylic on woven grass.

Acrylic, grass, dirt, hosiery on canvas.

Acrylic on roofing shingles.

Acrylic on sheet aluminum.

This piece, which I called "Man's Compromise" is meant to be read from the edges to the center.  I made this piece for a 2-D class; at the time I was very bitter about human's relationship with nature, which I saw as heartless, domineering, and void of respect for the other organisms in which we are supposed to share the earth. 

My idea for the piece was a clash of nature (represented here by a possum) and mankind (represented by development).  Other than the painting medium, acrylic, the materials I used were supposed to be a gradient.  On the far left, pure nature (wood/bark), on the far right, pure human (aluminum sheet metal).  You then move a step in: on the left, nature with a touch of human (grass, but woven, which is a human invention); on the right, human with a touch of nature (shingles, which I believed to be basically tiny rocks glued together--I don't know if that's really what they are.  but when you're trying to get a huge project done, you don't worry about details like that.).  

The center piece, the clash of nature and humans, uses both natural and man-made elements: real blades of grass have been painted into the grass, the guts of the animal are made of hosiery, and I'm pretty sure I threw some dirt into the guts.  I also painted on a blood drip, which hangs off the bottom of the canvas next to the guts.  (I was going for gory).

In terms of painted subject matter, the pieces on either end are meant to be the beginning of each party: a baby possum on the left, a house being built on the right.  Moving in, we see progression: a full-grown possum, and a street of white houses on the left.  The clash in the center is the endpoint for each party and depicts man's compromise with nature, which is really no compromise at all.  Man has run nature over--and smeared it on the road.  Humans are the clear victor of the clash, with their paved roads, towering city, and a smeared possum ignored on the outskirts in a haste to reach the city.