This painting was inspired by a song "Cold Little Heart" by Michael Kiwanuka. His lyrics cut deep-so deep they seem to pull your shadow to the surface. Shame, guilt, disappointment, and despair-all the feelings we tend to bury, rise up with a quiet, overwhelming force. Listening to this song feels like being thrown off a cliff into an ice-cold ocean, the shock is paralyzing. And yet, there's also a moment when you break through the surface, gasping, seeing the brand new foam glistening in the light. It's a moment of wanting, needing to believe that you CAN come out the other side.
This painting is about that plunge into shadow and the trembling hope of surfacing again. The rawness, the reckoning, and the fragile possibility of healing.
Beeswax, damar resin, dry pigments and shellac on cradled wood panel
