Behind the collaboration
The artwork was created during a very cyclical period for the artist. For several days prior to its creation, the artist was listening to Judy Garland’s Somewhere over the Rainbow, a bit of a hymn to hope. At the same time, the artist regularly watched the tornado scene from the beginning of the film The Wizard of Oz. The tornado in this 1939 classic reminded her of a more recent natural disaster, the one in the film Twister (one of the few VHS tapes in her family’s collection). In fact, it was The Lion King, Little Rascals and Twister that formed the basis of their film collection. To this day, the artist maintains that: These are the best films ever made! And it’s not because I’ve seen nothing else!
This obsession with the fast-moving wind then led her to reflect deeply on the symbolism of the yellow brick road on which Dorothy places her shiny red shoes. Of course, this questioning also led her to listen to Elton John’s Goodbye Yellow Brick Road over and over again, further immersing her in a whirlwind of obsessions and Wizardofoz-esque analysis. Eventually, the cycle was so intense that we had to put an end to this spiral of thoughts. It was starting to go round in circles.
And what better way to do so than to externalize this obsession through the exercise of drawing.
So she did. And it’s what’s on your Jersey today.
End of the Jersey story.