
Part of the “Skandinavia” series. One original edition available for public sale; and one available for gallery/museum request.
Named after the song “Underbart” by Little Dragon. “Underbart” is Swedish for wonderfully.
In the late 19th Century, there was a land grab competition in the African continent, and Germany sought to make their colonial imprint in the Namibia region in Southwest Africa. The Herero people revolted against German rule, at one point killing over 100 German settlers. Reinforcements went sent and the Herero were vanquished. Guerrilla warfare ensued, and the German response was to ship the Herero, and the Nama people who also rebelled, to concentration camps. One of the worst was located on Shark Island, off the southern coast.
This coincided with the Eugenics movement in science, and German doctors committed atrocities on the island in their attempts to prove Aryan superiority.
The irony of using barbarity to support a disfavored science is what brought forth this painting.
It was created in the aftermath of the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. I happened to be living in NYC at the time and worked in Times Square. That was a day of trauma for most of us. I sought to portray how one can find healing through reconnecting with their environment… being “humbled” by the natural world around you. The opposite of hubris; particularly the kind that would lead people to hypercapitalism and reactionary acts of terror. The moon, shining in the darkness, represents a hope to which an individual might give their soulful attention in challenging times. The tree in the background represents what’s to come once humility is embraced.
This piece embodies the transcendental journey that humans take when influenced by the act of love. All the expressions that words cannot contain, the sounds that can’t be heard… the visions… this can only be a glimpse; a voyeuristic perspective into the manifestation of natural human pleasure.