No, things are still the same. I still get nauseous when I see commercial after commercial advertising products made to break down so you continue consuming and contributing to a broken economy. I still feel rage when I hear of yet another 13 year old in Indonesia who's making 6 cents per shirt to feed a family of 8 courtesy of some popular brand name company. And I still can't sleep at night because all I can think about is the catastrophy that will occur to Alaska's fishing community if Pebble Mining starts extracting the copper and gold reserve found incidentally in an ecosystem that supplies 60% of the planets salmon.
And all I can think is, forgive them; they know not what they do.
These things, along with many, many others are what I am drawn to, they are what I am passionate about and I believe is the reason why I am here; to tell the world the truth.
But, unlike how I thought I would gather the information necessary to document and paint these issues (ie: pulling up my Google browser) I know that is not enough.
It is not enough to see the pictures of the children in South America being pulled off the streets, carried into black market OR's and having their organs removed. You see them clearly. They're the ones with the scars up their sides.
It's not enough to read an article about hospitals in Asia boxing up live new born baby girls because they were born an unfavorable sex.
It's certainly not enough to watch on the news yet another bombing dropped in the East used by "precision targeting systems" that wipe out entire villages of innocent civilians. The footage is a real kicker. How can you not cry when you see mothers holding their dead children in pieces?
All in the name of peace.
All in the name of God.
I have to be there. I have to help. I have to hold a starving child in Africa. I have to see with my own eyes people living in poverty stricken states where the only hope of supporting their families is to join the military. I have to document these issues myself. Google just won't do it for me.
I'm sure you can see where this is going...
I am taking some time off. To travel, to research. I am still having my Seven Deadly Sins shows, each done annually (or every 2 years, we'll see how it goes...) I've been doing a lot of soul searching, God's been helping me to re-evaluate what it is that I am here to do. I in no way believe I will save the world. But I do hope to be apart of change.
I hope to help get the ball rolling further, to get others involved and if nothing else to help change the way people view the world.
For the next few years I will be traveling to countries of conflict documenting different humanitarian and environmental issues which I will later paint for exhibition. I am really excited to get started, it would please me to no end to have a voice for those who do not, to tell the world the catatonic state we're in and to hopefully motivate others to change their lives and to encourage the people around them to do the same. I believe together we can change.
