I Am a Salvage Artist

I see this elegant Victorian Lady in a neighborhood in Providence.  A not-so-affluent neighborhood, where people have much more pressing worries than whether or not their house is painted.  There are many gorgeous homes like this one, built over one hundred years ago, that have fallen into disrepair.  And I want to gather them up, take them under my wing, kiss and bandage their scrapes, wipe away their tears, and paint their faces so that they are once again shining. 

I am a salvage artist. 

Where others see ruin, I see what once was.  Where others see a waste, I see possibility.  Where others can’t see anything but the present neglected state, I see what it could be, with a little love, paint, blood, sweat and tears.  A little spit shine, a little color, some nails and glue to tighten the loose parts, and suddenly, it is transformed.  It’s given another chance to be loved by someone, someone who just might call it “home”.

It’s not just houses.  It’s any object I see thrown in the trash, left by the roadside, unwanted.  I can’t count the number of times I have rescued abandoned furniture, jewelry boxes, and other bric-a-brac from the churning jaws of the garbage truck.  If I only had a bigger apartment to house them all...I have so much of these things that I lack the time to give each of them the attention they deserve.  So they wait patiently for their time to come, for their time to shine, to become art.  I’ve had to make myself stop taking things home, until I finish working on what I already have.  It’s not that I’m building a collection; it’s just that I see the beauty in these castoffs and want to extract it.  I just see a LOT of beauty, everywhere. 

“Children Of Resilience” – Mixed Media Assemblage (2008)

Not that long ago, it occurred to me that I have always tended to view people in this same way.  Especially when it came to romance.  I wanted to take home the broken, the unloved, the eccentric...and I did, often.  I would look past certain behaviors and see them as beautiful, as iridescent beings.  I saw their potential and I would attempt to bring it forth by loving them well.  Sometimes I would get gorgeous colors and shape formations floating before my eyes, and sometimes I got dull thuds, or at worst, sharp edges.  It wasn’t a matter of changing or saving anyone; it was a matter of mirroring their own beauty—which they possessed all along—back to them. 

As I got older, I began to realize that I couldn’t transform anyone—I am not able to manipulate or change their essence like I can by painting and lettering a wooden box.  I can do anything I want to an object.  People, however, are free to create themselves as they see fit, and to destroy themselves as they see fit—regardless of how many coats of love I apply.  Not that there’s anything inherently wrong about showing someone how amazing they are in your eyes—it’s expecting them to see themselves in the same light and adhere to it.  It’s unfair, and unrealistic.  And often, it’s how you get your wrist slapped or your heart broken.  At forty-three, I now know to leave those that I see potential in to realize it on their own, should they want that.  If they don’t, my job is to wish them well and walk on by.  I still have the desire to uplift them, with my words, with my art, and I still try that, but now I let them be the ones to pick up the paintbrush...or not. 

Now I prefer to be amongst those who have already created complete people out of themselves.  Not perfect people—complete people.  Those who are happy in their own skins, who don’t seek another to finish their own puzzles.  There is no desire to manipulate on either of our parts—there is simply admiration for the fine craftsmanship we have already shown in making ourselves shine.  I still show them how resplendent they are, but these folks already know it, having worked damned hard on polishing their own surfaces. 

These days, my beautification projects are reserved for the inanimate.  I can slap a coat of paint onto those things I find.  I imagine I’m making them better than they were.  As an artist, that is my job: to remake things over in accordance with my own vision, to stamp the world with my mark, to see deeper than the surface, to realize possibility, and to have the grit to bring that possibility into the world by my own hand. 

I’m a salvage artist.  It’s what I do.