Severance
Acrylic and Oil on Canvas
30 x 40
The idea here was inspired by Radiohead’s Morning Bell. One of the lyrics in the song reads, “Cut the kids in half”. I could not get this lyric out of my head for weeks, so I decided I had to make a painting in response to it. While I am not entirely sure what Radiohead intended for the song to mean, my painting is an interpretation of what I get from it. I related the lyric to the division of lives that occurs when parents divorce from one another. The children are often cut in half as if they are little more than material property. I rendered the white contour figures atop a paint splatted background, mimetic of chalk outlines on asphalt, to represent the death of the American family as a unit. My intent was not to be overly critical of divorce, but simply to bring the issue to light.