The is one of the first large scale pieces of artwork I created and it was created for my brother a few months after he died in February of 2021. This was the second collage of this kind I have created. The other I made while I was in college, shortly before I dropped out due to severe depression.

I remember that first collage. I was feeling depressed and had recently visited an old comic book store. I raided the bargain bin. I picked up a stack of 25 cent copies of random comics I’d never heard of, but I had an idea in mind for how to use them.

I got to my dorm room where I lived alone and threw the stack on the floor. I turned on some music, grabbed a piece of large poster board and Elmer’s glue and sat down, ready to work.

I flipped through the comics letting my eye gravitate towards the images that felt most compelling to me, no matter the context of the image. I cut out expressive graphics; faces of fear and pain and surprise. Oddly one of the comic books told the story line of a woman who was captured and being injected or experimented on – I snipped out a lot of imagery from that one.

It was one of my favorite pieces and was unlike anything I created before. Feeling more brazen than usual, I hung it up on the outside of my dorm-room door. I found that, later that week students would stop by to look at it and I even had someone leave a sticky note asking if I had more to share. I was never able to meet that person because I dropped out of college a few weeks later. That piece was a marker of how dark things had become.

When I drove home from college, I brought my artwork home. It was raining that day. I remember pulling things out of my car and bringing them into my parent’s house. My family didn’t do much to help me move back, there was a lot of shame cast upon me for leaving.

In an attempt to reduce my trips from my car to inside the house, I grabbed too many items at once. The stack of art I had tucked under my arm slipped down a little and one single piece of artwork fell out. The collage I had created floated down like a leaf and landed on the concrete driveway outside of my home. It quickly soaked up the standing rainwater as it continued to rain gently.

I had to get the rest of my artwork inside so I ran in and back out. But it was like the piece disintegrated before my eyes. I picked it up, damp and falling apart. I tried to dry it off but over the next few days, as it dried, all the cut-out pieces of comic book I’d painstakingly glued together, fell off, ruining the piece. Eventually, I conceded defeat and tossed it in the bin.

It would be nearly 15 years before I made another collage like it. The loss of the collage was painful for me to remember, even though I loved collage as a medium for expression. Unknowingly, I had reserved that kind of artistic process for only moments of deep introspection and pain.

My brother loved super heroes and sports. Something we shared was our love of the DC character Batman. So when he died, I sought out to make a portrait of of my brother inspired by the characters from the Batman universe. While I made several drawings and portraits of my brother in diff. mediums around that time this one would be different. I wanted, no, needed it to make a statement.

This piece needed to be unique, expressive, dynamic, and communicate how much I cared. The meticulous work I spent snipping out small shapes and gently connecting and layering them would hopefully show just that. I spent roughly three, 10-12 hour days working on this with few breaks. Owing to my ADHD, it’s sometimes easy for me to fixate or hyper-focus on a project. It feels like I’m being driven by an invisible motor that won’t shut off until I complete my objective.

Eventually the larger picture came together. I could have filled the entire page with comic designs but, truthfully, I thought it might distract from the core portrait (and I was running out of B&W comics with the right texture and subject matter anyway).

The final addition was painting a solid black acrylic field behind the collage. I felt like it helped focus the image and let it pop from the background itself. It also tied together all the contrasting elements in the comic imagery.

After my brother passed away I went over to his house to begin the long process of cleaning up. I slowly walked into his room and sat down on his bed. The same bed he had passed away in. I tried not to look at the ghastly brown stain that remained and instead looked everywhere around the room.

I’d actually never been in his bedroom as an adult. I took in the layout. Tried to sense him, was he still there, somewhere? Where did you go? His clothes were strewn about, just like when we were kids. The furniture was simple, bachelor pad for sure. And then I looked at what hung on the walls.

There were only two items. One was a generic sunset ocean photograph printed on a canvas. Something you might buy from a department store to fill a space. Or maybe he really loved it, hard to know. But the other item, wasn’t quite mounted. It sit atop his TV leaning against the wall in the center of the room almost like it was spotlit by the single floodlight light in the room.

The loosely framed image was a comic panel I had drawn while I was in graduate school years ago. At the time, I was practicing vintage comic art styles for one of my drawing classes and I had created a large panel depicting Batman and Cat Woman fighting. My professors at the time were accomplished comic artists so they had given me feedback and support on the piece. The final artwork was a huge improvement in my raw skill from when I had first started art school.

I remember when I gave him the comic for Christmas. I actually didn’t have time to go shopping that year. As a grad student I lacked funds and was always busy. But I did have that piece. So I framed it and wrapped it up for him. I was surprised, by how much he enjoyed the gift. He paused staring at it intently and then said, “You drew this??”

I was taken aback by his reaction. I was sitting there feeling anxious and guilty that I didn’t give him something more interesting, more valuable.

But here it was. I had gifted it to him maybe 10 years prior and it was still there in the same condition I had given it to him. The proof of his care and love stared back at me, immutable, timeless, and a little lonely.

My niece, one of his two kids, wanted the piece so I let them take it with them. I didn’t have the heart to ask for it back and I was happy they found value in it as well. If it could bring them any sense of comfort, I wanted them to have it.

And when I finished the collage of my dear brother, I dedicated a special place in my house for it to hang. I got it framed, painted the wall, and placed a light above it. In a way, it mirrors the piece my brother had in his room. A special piece of artwork that connects us both. And when I walk by, I get to be reminded of that connection everyday, just like my brother.