Saboteur

Surrounded by comic book scraps, newspaper clippings, and tree stumps, is the winged Saboteur. The figure gently cradles a Grecian temple in his hands – a symbol of enlightenment conveniently covering his pubis. Haunted by a looming phallic shadow, the figure is at once a Christian angel with “eyes twisted upwards in the style of a baroque sufferer” and Mercury/Hermes, “the messenger and ancient god of trade.” (Emmerling, pp16-19).

“This feel-good messenger is a bearer of uncertain tidings. The image, constructed in the first instance from torn pieces of paper, has a feel of ephemera. The head has been stripped from its flesh revealing the subcutaneous bone and tissue. Though angelical in pose, the gritty head is in sharp contrast to the soft body parts, and the strategically placed ‘temple of enlightenment’ in the genital area questions the nature and direction of this enlightenment.” --- Allen in Skin of Years, p269.

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