C.B. Murphy  .:. Writer

I showed Sandler a printout of my latest environmental-religious art. It took him a while to figure out that it was a printout of a painting that I’m working on. We discussed belief. He said he could feel the Apocalypse coming. When I explained James Lovelock’s idea (we need nuclear powered cities in the Artctic now!) which he liked it. I explained the four faces were Al Gore, Rachel Carson, James Lovelock and Pocahontas. He thought Pocahontas was a beard-free Jesus. Thanks. I didn’t try to explain that the vegetation would be an homage to Henri Rousseau. I didn’t want to sound like a pedant.

Sander and Jacob are “homeboys” though I didn’t know that tattooed, long-haired white guys who both subscribe to the “Viking religion” would refer to themselves that way. They were giving Rudy a hard time during our Character First discussion (we do this every Tuesday) on our topic, “Enthusiasm.” During the exchange it came out that Jacob was called The Terrorist because of his long beard and his amazing ability at sacking quarterbacks during their (flag?) football games. Perhaps Rudy is on a different team. I don’t know. It might be an alpha-dog thing.

Lamar is doing art again after a long hiatus. Not sure why. A self portrait in watercolor. I call him the Professor, though no one else does. He often reads marketing books or books about unusual investment opportunities (things like oil drilling rights) during class. Now he’s reading a book on world conspiracies like the Freemasons, etc. I actually have the book, which is weird. He seems to have a special status of some kind. Character First is never the same when he doesn’t show up. He likes to start with saying what bullshit it all is and how “they” (guards, people outside of prison) ought to do it before they bring it to the inmates. Jack (the instructor) and I often tease him about his giving advice professionally, though today he was offended when we both laughed when he said they should make him the warden. Sometimes we joke about “What Would Rene Say?” Rene always liked to talk during Character First. He would always bring it back to weed, beating up your lady, and things that were totally contrary to anything in the program. But he was entertaining and liked the role playing games.

Salvatore is becoming quite the artist, at ease with invention and wild Fauvian colors. He was working on the first person I’d seen him paint, a black jazz saxophonist. His eyes are bad. I always ask him about his glasses. He always says they’ve been “sent out”  though he said they were like the glasses on the jazz musician which where oval and tight to the face (Oakley?) and blue. I couldn’t easily see him wearing any blue tinted glasses in prison.

Alonzo and I discussed why he hates everything he does. He made a rather nice expressionistic landscape (the most popular art style in the class) in a magenta monochrome. I made the mistake of calling it a river when it was supposed to be a path. He’s very hard on himself and Rudy who sits next to him didn’t help by explaining that he’s lived near rivers and they don’t have edges as jagged as Alonzo’s path/river. I pointed out small rocks in the original he worked from, but mostly I hope he doesn’t paint over it.

Fairchild, a large Mexican man fairly new to the class, was working on what used to be called a “pinup” in World War II, but I don’t know what the word would be now–an attractive woman vamping in front of a shiny old car with lots of chrome. But he’s doing it in pencil. We discussed looking at the sections of chrome as miniature abstract paintings, though I have to be careful. Sometimes I just am imagining a piece I might do given the material they are showing me. Later I saw Sandler helping him draw, though Fairchild is quite good. He’s very proud that he has a background in painting cars, like flames and such.

It was the last time I’d see Baxter as he was getting out. I was hoping he’d be friendlier as I was thinking about talking to him about his talents. His copying skills are amazing. He copied one of Van Gogh’s self portraits and a section of the Sistine Chapel as gifts for Jack. He’s planning to have a small gallery next to his tatoo and car painting business once he gets it off the ground. I had a hard time imagining it until we talked about him painting people’s bikes (motorcyles) in a landscape setting. Maybe people do this, but it’s a great idea for a micro-market. I don’t know many bikers.

Sharif walked into the room with a big smile on his face. He’s a big friendly Black Muslim guy who recently left in a bit of a huff. He said Jack was racist not to pick a black guy for the tutor spot. Now we have three white tutors, but partly because our two Mexican ones were “fired” for gang-related offenses though Jack says they are innocent. I wondered if Jack would be angry that Sharif came into the room because part of the problem with those firings was an accusation that people were in our room without passes. But nobody seemed to care too much about Sharif walking in.

(All names have been changed.)