AMERICAN TRIPTYCH
VISIONS OF HEAVEN AND HELL ON EARTH, lost, remembered, and given up on. But I’m not sure what they all mean, not being religious. Sometimes the pictures explain themselves and I just write it down. Sometimes, while they seem to be talking to me, I can’t understand a thing. They are like TV shows with the closed captions turned off. And I just guess…
“The Expulsion” (top): This shows a variation on a popular around here origin myth that is meant to explain to adherents why, given their belief in a benevolent creator, that life often sucks, only sometimes is a joy, but is, most of the time, good enough. The answer given is that it’s our fault; we asked too many questions.
This alternative to that, shows Ur-girl opting for the assertive Angel-In-Command over merely inquisitive Ur-boy. She “shall be as gods” and remain in paradise and Ur-boy is banished. He is now homeless, jobless and pointless, but at least he has his “knowing good and evil” pal, Serpent, to help him find a way.
“Noli Us Tangere” (Middle): Ur-boy and Serpent are now in a hyperreal theme park; the tableaux they pass by are simulations, of sanctified and commodified “love” (pair-bonding, home and family, whatever) and “career” (satisfaction, respect, creative expression, etc.)
But as real as these scenes appear, they are really just Stage 4 of Jean Baudrillard’s hyperreality. Stage 1 being a reflection of reality; Stage 2 is a perversion or politicization of it; Stage 3 is a pretend or alternative reality; and Stage 4 is where there is no pretense at all that anything is really real.
“Judgement Day Shift” (Bottom): The fantasy ride in the middle panel has ended and it’s back to the real world for Ur-boy and Snake, where they stack and unstack commodities and consumables, symbols and substitutes for hours on end at poverty level wages and no benefits. At least they have jobs. A job without purpose is better than a purpose without a job, they say
They (AIC, Ur-girl and others of their kind) also say: work hard, pay your bills, keep your head down and don’t ask too many questions and the good life can be yours. They imply that that’s how they got it, some believe that, others don’t, but none care whether you do or don’t. The truth—Believe me!—is that they got their good life by keeping you from yours, and they have no intention or incentive to change that.
So heaven and hell are both here and now, they are just different neighborhoods. Same city, different planets. For Ur-girl, AIC and their spawn and ilk it’s a gated community where all is the best. For the rest of us, we live as best as we can, where we can in places that often suck, sometimes are a joy but most of the time are just good enough. But that’s good enough, isn’t it?
