Between the Tall Stalks

Corn was part of the first Thanksgiving when Wampanoag peoples shared a harvest meal with the pilgrims of Plymouth plantation in Massachusetts. In this autumn fest, corn served not only as delightful cooking but a medium of communication between two distinctive cultures, an offering that connects two strange communities. The continuation of usurpation, purchase, war, and treaty later slowly eradicated the indigenous culture. Ironically what was left on the land was corn, the original offering transformed into millions of yards of fields built on the tear and the blood of their givers. The fluorescent pink contrasts with the graphite linear background, leaving a heavy trace of modernity over the simple natural presentation. Despite our ambitions, artificial constructions can never cover nature, as the graphite managed to be seen through under the acrylic. The pink woman herself justifies our need from nature: curled up in the most innate body gesture of protection, though trying to dominate nature, she found herself being nurtured by nature with the corns.  Neither the woman nor the corn dominates over each other; they coexist. The painting intends to find the balance and the possibility of symbiosis as resolutions of deep conflicts between cultures, human beings and nature, and within ourselves.

We can’t raise beyond the tall stalks; we live within the tall stalks.