"In the Cedars" - Third in the five-part series 'Bodies' - Mixed media on plywood. My 118th painting.

 

In the Cedars

May 28, 1991 - Tuscola, Texas.

The claustrophobic trail opened to a modest clearing amidst the densely wooded area. Five bodies. Secured to a long wooden bench by large rusty spikes - one through each thigh. Wrists and ankles lashed tightly with barbed wire. 

Each body decapitated, heads in their laps. The corpses were burned down to the muscle, the heads untouched by fire. Then, the eerie feeling of being watched. 

It was the heads - the eyes were still intact. With a closer look, a more disturbing element introduced itself - each forehead had a word carved into it. Those words formed a sentence: “We died for our sins.” 

A pattern was emerging. 

"An Otherwise Calm Night" - Second in the five-part series 'Bodies' - Mixed media on plywood. My 117th painting.

 

An Otherwise Calm Night

May 14, 1991 - Artesia, New Mexico.

Three minutes outside the city limits, on a stray gravel road, a burned-out car held secrets. Two charred bodies in the front seat - one in the trunk. 

The gas tank had been cut and welded back together. Inside were the severed heads, hands and feet of the victims. A shovel lay several yards to the right - its handle covered in dried blood. The acrid scent of burning metal still choked the air. 

One-hundred and seventy-five miles away…

"Deviant" - First in the five-part series 'Bodies' - Mixed media on plywood. My 116th painting.

 

Deviant

May 7, 1991 - El Paso, Texas.

Soft streaks of amber pierce through the dark to bring another morning to the bad side of town. 

An old couch, cushions ripped - springs exposed, sits matter of fact in a filthy alleyway. Atop this heap - a most gruesome spectacle - a bound and partially burned body. 

Male. Caucasian. Possibly in the fourth decade of life. His night had been worse than yours. Genitals removed - lodged in esophagus. Eyes gouged out - inserted into rectum. Body cavity emptied - filled with plastic doll parts - sewn shut with fishing line. Nothing at random. 

Hanging from his neck - a thin scrap of plywood that reads: “I deserve this”. There would be many questions. 

This was the beginning.