Cracktal Compositions
Cracktal Composition II
A collage of stone lithographs printed on panels of Formica that are ripped and cracked, then varnished and laminated to wood. Three-stone lithographs.
Text fragments in reverse are from the oath of allegiance, the pledge to the flag, and the Flemish song of independence. The work was created in the year of my American citizenship with a Kala Fellowship, 1992 - 1993
Size: 56" x 99"
1993 A triptych
About the perspective of the map seen from below:
Herlinde Spahr, About Reversals in Printmaking. California Printmaker, 1998, pp.2-3
Cracktal Composition I
Same technique as above. The poem, fragmented and reversed is by Leonard Nathan. It was written for this project. I add the poem below.
Size: 96" x 37"
1993
With support of a Kala Fellowship
THE MAP
In this dream, summer was all year around
our land a map of child-like colors, green
for the north, red for the south, blue for the shallow
western sea we waded all day long.
The roads that always brought us home, the streams
we fished, were curving lines. In this dream
our feet, walking where they would, believed
in a granite earth one endless layer deep.
But if you held this map up to the light,
you could see other lines, not roads or streams,
but tiny cracks suddenly opening under
shakey towns, a car wheel's panic spin.
Become a magnifying mirror, the map
revealed the cracks in everything, fine cracks
curling from other cracks, a world of cracks,
of faults we discovered far below our faith.
You could find patterns there, scriptures that promised
deep and earthy truths, though not to live by,
even as you tried to wake yourself,
even as you dreamed you were awake.
Leonard Nathan 1993
Detail from Cracktal Composition II
This work was included in the book "The Best in Printmaking" but the image was reproduced in reverse, reversing my reversal.
