2003

Today in the garage I found a box containing a drawing created on broken pieces of plaster. It was a reaction to the US starting a war in Iraq in 2003. I remember feeing so shocked and horrified by the news and the way life all around me seemed to just keep humming along, business as usual, while people in the Middle East were being killed.

I started thinking about my lack of response to the unlawful war the US started in Iran four weeks ago. Shock, horror and empathy for the people being attacked is buried beneath my disgust and anger toward the corrupt regime operating out of the White House. The steady dissolving of democratic norms and institutions over the past ten years has desensitized my reaction to violence and injustice. Not good!  

How might I break out of this bubble and create something in response to the current war? Whatever is expressed is welcome, disgust, numbness, rage, it does not matter. I want to break out of my detachment and impassivity.

The first image shows the plaster shards in the correct sequence. They are meant to be stretched out in one long line on a plain white wall but couldn't capture it here.