''Yolky Masses Bleeding to the Fringes''

”… the overall effect is one of a primordial stew- a miasma of mythological archetypes from the shared human unconscious, played against a barren American landscape”.

Don Van Vliet, aka Captain Beefheart, an icon of experimental music has followed the same aesthetic in his post-modern painting and drawing. As a visual artist, Vliet has also rejected most formal limits to arrive or approach the pure essence of an idea. This trek to the essence is often of Beowulfian magnitude as the visual forms are often shape shifting images of man and beast, almost resembling the mythical Grendel in nature.

Rolled Roots Gnarled Like Rakers

More politely called ”naturalistic imagery”, Vliets art careens widely between the naive and the nightmarish sprinkled with whimsey.It could be termed an abstract primitive style for the sake of definition. Its a detached ironic view of the ego’s dependence on instincts and  demonic impulses that owe allegiance to no-one.

Each composition begins with a thick impasto of white paint from which his forms are suspended and compete against for primacy within the work. There is almost always a movement towards the fringes and margins of the work. ” The forms are frequently compared to totemic icons, cave paintings, or expressions of unbridled unconscious; indeed it is the painted omission to any traces of the modern world…”

Cross Poked Shadow of a Crow No. 1 (1990)