"The Artist as a Saviour, the Saviour as an Artist"*

Acrylic on Canvas
Size     32  x 60 in.

                 SOLD

Artist’s Comments  (Artist’s Comments are intended solely for those viewers who would appreciate more information on the motivations and processes involved in each painting.  They are not intended to direct how anyone might respond to or interpret my work.)

"The idea that an artist, by making a painting or sculpture, could insert images into the stream of public speech and thus change political discourse has gone...."                          Robert Hughes,  The Shock of the New

The visual inspiration for this piece grew from the double self portrait with actual hand prints of myself and friends.    The concept behind the work explores whether artists can still change (save) the world with their art.  According to Hughes that idea died out when the concentration camps were opened up after WW 11.  

As an artist I wonder how creativity played a part in the life of Christ.  How different was his creative image-making mind from that of today's artist? Nothing in the Bible speaks of his creating images.                                                                           What was the true nature of Christ?  Many new theories are evolving based on new historical research.

As with the art of Aboriginal Australia (where I lived for a year) I have infused the work with several layers of meaning, based on symbols of personal concerns. For example, the writing in the center of the canvas is a list, written in Greek, of the names of Greek gods and goddesses.