“Icarus Ectefe Xrine”

Icarus Ectefe Xrine

This is a picture of a yuppie “Icarus”, dressed for his office job, with his signature red Chicago Bulls cap, in an argument with sister Xrine. St. Louis (Arynluimy) occupies my boyhood bedroom door, while the Des Plaines River flows in my sister’s room (she worked at a riverboat casino). Xrine is dressed as she was as a teenager, with her Catholic school tartan skirt and long hair. Under her, “the revision”, the Italian inscription “my little sister stayed in town”. Under Icarus, “the prototype”, “the brutal wretch of a brother left for the city.” At the top the Italian reads “How I lost my dear sister”, followed by a misstated Spanish phrase intended to say “how I miss her”. Icarus is my avatar in self portraiture throughout my early and mid twenties, questing and eager, but ultimately brooding and lonely. Icarus of mythology met his end after flying too close to the sun, only to crash in the Aegean Sea. The title of the work means “Icarus fights his own sister”, intended to be pejorative and shameful; the event ever dogging me then. Architect J. Guenther and singer Aixâ have signed the top page. Drawn 16 January 1997, Tayya 5740, five dozen seventh phase (Ñixaþ-Asmaral Xrga), at Cafe Danielle in the Central West End.

This page last modified Thursday 5 April 2012.