“Try Using The Brakes!”
MEDIUM:
Cradled wood panel- assemblage: moulding paste, painted rag board fabricated auto coffins with wooden wheels.
ARTWORK:
24½” x 27½” x 3″
FRAME:
Satin white finished wood
25½” x 28¼” x 3½”
DRAFT
“Everybody’s talking about heaven like they just can’t wait to go.”
1. Kobalt Music Publishing
Artist Note: Let’s suppose the cultural origins of heaven and hell are not unlike the principals of right and wrong or good and bad from which some find solace and others mayhem. A more contrarian interpretation by Isaac Asimov (1920-1992 ) claims: “I don’t believe in an afterlife, so I don’t have to spend my whole life fearing hell, or fearing heaven even more. For whatever the tortures of hell, I think the boredom of heaven would be even worse.” 2.
However, who wouldn’t want to go to heaven providing it’s like we were told.
Artwork: The artwork offers yet another description of heaven as a place where everyone is an immigrant waiting for a visa and a vacancy to open. Once entering this new universe we find it not unlike the prior one. Because heaven is so vast and full of planets everyone needs a car to get around. As a consequence of having no speed limits there are enormous traffic jams and accidents. If the overworked angels who oversee this mayhem decide you are unruly they can send to you to hell for a long time.
Given this description of heaven, the lyrics by the Talking Heads Band couldn’t be more wrong headed. “Heaven is a place, a place where nothing, nothing ever happens.” 3.
Footnotes: 1. S. Carter, McGinn, L. Rimes: Song Writers, Heaven Lyrics, Kobalt Music Publishing Ltd. N.Y. N.Y., Released, October 6, 2017. 2. Joey, Green: Philosophy on the Go, Isaac, Asimov AZ Qoutes, Running Press Book Publishers, April, 2007. 3. Byrne, D., Harrison, J.: Song Writers, Heaven sung by Talking Heads Band, American New Wave Band recording “Fear of Music, Warner/Chappell Music, Released, August 3, 1979.
Note: The astronomer Carl Sagan’s (1934-1996) 1979 aphorism “Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence” may be the best guide when deciding what to believe.