Posts from — April 2007

(Male, 40′s) I was watching a DVD of a television show. Actually I was trying to watch a DVD of a television show, some kind of situation comedy or something, but the disc kept skipping. In real life my DVD player often skips or stops playing all together but this DVD kept skipping from this brightly lit sit-com stage to this really dark footage that was clearly out of place with the TV show. The TV isn’t hooked up to cable so it’s not coming from there. It must be somewhere hidden on the disc. The footage is a medium shot of a human form wrapped head to toe in dark grey burlap and then bound with thick ropes. The person is still alive because they’re flailing, slapping the concrete floor like a dolphin on dry land. And another thing is that the burlap is soaking wet. It’s shiny and it makes a slapping sound as the figure moves. For some reason, I know enough of the story line to know that this person has just been pulled out of a torpedo tube, “rescued” into the submarine… but then again no one seems in much of a hurry to undo the ropes and unwind the burlap. Some rescue. There’s no one in the footage though, just this figure struggling alone. The image will fuzz in and out to the sit com with a lot of static. This footage interrupts the sit-com so much it’s really starting to disturb me so I get up and I take the disc out so I can clean it, maybe make it go away. The disc itself is deformed, like it had been melted and then smeared down a plate or something. I don’t even know how it could have fit in the DVD tray.

One of the Grim Gnome’s hobbies is to assemble and paint models of classic horror figures. This one is a little obscure and so deserves a little commentary. Her name is Angel Fink and she was designed by Big Daddy Roth. Roth was one of the key figures in the hot rod movement and he came up with the Rat Fink characters. Angel Fink, I gather, mixed up the special blend of fuel for the hot rods.

I just thought she was a rather cool, stylized “witch.” I made a little cauldron for her out of Super-Sculpy and sprayed a little of that expanding foam stuff inside the cauldron so it looks like she’s presiding over a boiling batch of goo. To contrast the red of her gown, I painted the goo a nice, sickeningly fluorescent green.

Does it sort of bother you that someday you’ll likely have to buy a casket that will be used pretty much for one day and pretty much for one purpose? Then check out the wares at Casket Furniture.

(http://www.casketfurniture.com/ )

The models there run from fun to functional. All seem handsome and well-crafted. And if you’re a do-it-yourself-er, they also offer plans. If I hadn’t already made plans to have my body composted and fed to my Rosa Rugosa, I’d be eyeing that “Eternaltainment Center” model.

OK one more illustration from my daughter. This one really blows me away. It’s a depiction of the moment of death, the moment when someone literally “gives up the ghost.” Her ghost here looks a lot like the ghost I posted in Gallery #1 but the context of it coming out of somebody’s wide open mouth makes it amazing. At least to me. I’m her father, of course.

Around the time when my daughter drew these sketches, we had a neighbor who was an artist. He saved scraps of art supplies for my daughter to play with. He claimed to see spirits and his contention was that my daughter also could see “them.” Of course when I asked her about this now she says “I have no idea what he was talking about.”

(Female, 60′s) In my dream, we were getting ready for my second daughter’s wedding. It was going to be a huge wedding — at least as big an affair as my first daughter’s wedding the year before. I wanted everything to be just perfect. Finally it was the day before the wedding and I went for the final fitting on my dress, a really lovely mother’s of the bride dress. The rest of the bridal party was also trying on their dresses for the last time before the wedding. I was in the dressing room putting on my dress. As I slipped it over my head, the dress stuck because it was suddenly way too small. I’ve always had a tendency to be overweight, but I could not believe that the dress would not fit me! I must have gained 20 pounds from when the dress had been fitted. I couldn’t get it on by myself and I couldn’t get it off. I was completely stuck! I had to call for help, and I started to cry because there was absolutely no way that I could wear that dress to the wedding! I didn’t know what I was going to do! And when the door opened everyone saw me stuck in the dress.

(When I woke up, I was in such a panic. I had to try on my dress immediately and, fortunately, the real-life dress was the right size!)

OK another one of my brilliant daughter’s illustrations. This one is obviously someone who is so scared their hair is standing on end.

Maybe. That’s pretty long hair.

Maybe it’s like Medusa, some one who we’re supposed to be afraid of. Either way, I thought it deserved its own post.