El Zonte Work

Dark drawings  2011  colored pencil on bristol  8 x 12 inches

In El Zonte, I was struck by the extinguishing strength of night time.  Perhaps, this was due to the contrast with the nights in Delhi, where lights, dust, and pollution keep the city in a perpetual black-yellow haze after dark.  In El Salvador, the few streetlights or outdoor bulbs created islands of illumination with deep shadows. 

I began to draw these points at which the light seemed to drop off- and shadows could be both shallow or deep spaces.  Each view is paired with an object I collected at the scene, often these were minimally visible, but a piece of the site I drew nonetheless.

Like other artists at the residency, I also wanted to work with some of the natural materials of the coast.  The black volcanic sand seemed like a visually interesting, but unpredictable choice of material.  At some times it seemed to absorb light and crumble like charcoal, at other times it reflected light like mica flecks in granite. I mixed white glue with water and applied it with brushes and then worked in sections, alternately painting on the glue, dropping sand, and then shaking off the sand, so the image slowly revealed itself.

Fighters  2011  volcanic sand on canvas 36 x 49 inches

This image is a popular newspaper photograph from the El Salvador civil war, which lasted from 1979 - 1992.  At our open house at the end of January, people who saw the drawing were able to decipher a great deal - somewhat to my surprise given that its a pretty minimal image.  As I was told, the image shows rebel groups returning from a small battle.  They are identifiable as rebel guerrillas from the conflict because of the presence of a woman fighter and because of her white shirt (government soldiers were exclusively men and dress in camouflage uniforms).  Newspapers during the war showed fighting that people in El Salvador experienced sometimes firsthand, but often heard in the distance or read about from other parts of the country.  I was curious how the reports of the war seemed both tangible but also disjointed for people living in the country during the war.  Images of women fighters were a special surprise.  Visiting the country now, evidence of the war is less obvious and conversations revealed a hesitancy to talk about the war and an impulse to forget its atrocities.  

Fighters detail

Over the course of several days the sand began to fall from the drawing, slowly erasing the image.