Science, Government, Education, Art, the cultural monolith may be said to exist primarily to exercise a paternal influence, decorously if possible, aggressively if necessary, to enforce certain accepted images upon individuals.
Eleanor AntinPompeii, especially, with its grand murals and its flourishing gardens haunted by the dark shadow of Vesuvius, has always suggested uncomfortable parallels with our contemporary world, especially here in Southern California, where the sunlit life also turns out to have dark shadows in which failure and death lurk at the edge of consciousness. Now in these times, we have even closer parallels with those ancient, beautiful, affluent people living the good life on the verge of annihilation.
Eleanor Antin