April 27, 2014

Blood is Thicker than Politics

This was originally intended as a political comment, but it turned into art instead, or something at least near it. The point was that the hands would draw blood from each other, and the blood would go somewhere else, for soon it is Taxation Day in Sweden, and as welfare has been lowered but taxes not quite so one might wonder where money goes.


But art shouldn't be simple like a political cartoon. It thrives on double, triple and multiple entendre, on uncertainty. Art is true democracy; it offers room for the individual and her interpretations in a way that no ideology can do. Instead, my hands turned into simply emptying each other of the vital fluid -- or if they vainly try to fill each other with blood, I don't know. A mysterious closed circuit, pointless in itself -- as many ideas are.


I wanted the blood to be a thicker fluid, but I already liked this slightly gaseous look and when an aquarelle is beginning to look well you must take your hands off. No brushes or syringes allowed.