hello kevin thrasher

I don’t believe in fate or determinism, but I do believe that when you’re born with a surname like Thrasher, you have a certain obligation to society to do something cool with your life. Had I been born a Thrasher, I might have formed a death metal band or dabbled in Mexican wrestling (as things stand, I’m fulfilling my own destiny as a writer who really likes whiskey), but my friend Kevin Thrasher chose to become a photographer. Right now he’s finishing up his MFA at Mass Art in Boston. You should check out his website.

Perhaps you know it can be a delicate business, having an Artist Friend. We all have at least one. As much as we’d like to imagine we’re super special snowflakes, the truth is our social networks are all populated by the same types. Joseph Campbell waxed lyrical on the hero with 1,000 faces, but who will sing the praises of the Frugal Friend, the one who pulls out a calculator when the restaurant bill comes? Or the Asperger’s Friend that talks too loud and embarrasses you at parties? Or the Artist Friend who covers Indigo Girls songs on open mic night and/or e-mails you his poetry?

“Now, wait a minute, missy” you’re thinking, “are YOU not my Artist Friend?” Well, yes, but I’m the polite sort of Artist Friend who’s not going to ask you to read my novel. (Also, I'm probably already busy being your Bitch Friend.) I remember talking about writing once with my friend M, one of those rare birds who is somehow simultaneously totally ironic and painfully sincere without coming off as a huge twat. (He makes me wonder if god is really, like, Robot Wes Anderson.) Once M told me a cautionary tale about his friend who wrote a really bad novel. “We were really proud that she finished this thing that was hundreds of pages,” he said. “On the other hand, there were fairies with clipped wings.”

His ambivalence, I believe, just about sums up the normative feelings one has for an Artist Friend—a sensation composed of equal parts cheerleading, pity, and intense secret shame. I imagine that looking at an Artist Friend's work is sort of like watching a retarded child at a talent show. Like: Yay! That’s so good…for you!

When I was in New York last summer, Kevin and I went to the New Museum to see the “Younger than Jesus” exhibit, which featured fifty under-33s who are definitely somebody’s Artist Friends, if you know what I mean. I left the museum with two important takeaways: (1) Even though I’m old, I’m still younger than Jesus. YES! (2) My generation kind of sucks at art. There were a few cool things and an awful lot of soulless video art starring people in bad wigs reading dictionaries by the light of, like, glow-in-the-dark dildos.

Later that afternoon, at a bar, I thumbed through a stack of Kevin’s recent prints and thought about how much better they were than almost everything we’d seen at the New Museum. His little collection seemed so well balanced—technically good without being so polished that it’s boring. His work is beautiful but never precious. It’s clever without being gimmicky, thoughtful but not overwrought. He offers a point of view without ever being obvious or didactic, which, as any artist younger than Jesus can tell you, is really, really hard to do.

Kevin has a painter’s eye for color, a way of teasing out saturated greens, rich browns, and pretty blues from landscapes that are recognizable, but somehow heightened, as though you’ve gone on a hike with a fever. It’s all shot through with this amazing electric earthy orange that’s like red clay mixed with blood—a charged palette befitting his rural settings, which are anything but tranquil.





I believe Kevin has taken some of the best elements of the Southern Gothic aesthetic—the gritty beauty of the opening sequence from True Blood, the sinister weirdness of those Boys for Pele-era Tori Amos portraits with creepy farm animals and dirty mattresses, the fire in the gut of a Flannery O’Connor character—and made them wholly his. His “Gap Creek RD” series showcases the menace and melancholy and unease and wit that are hallmarks of a Southern sensibility: a shed at the end of a lonely path, Bud Light boxes filled with disembodied deer heads, a solitary bone lying on a rocky bank.







Kevin works in the tradition of what I’m going to call found-object photography, meaning that his subjects are happened upon in real life rather than conceived of and created. (There is probably a real word for this, but you get the idea.) I admire his knack for imbuing these unstaged scenes with such a strong sense of narrative and mystery. He has an eye for story, a real gift for being suggestive in a way that never seems forced or contrived. Like a cat that drops a dead mouse at your feet as a present, his pictures are offered honestly and without fanfare.

I think it is that sense of openness, of speaking plainly, that helps him convey a sense of wide-eyed wonder without letting things get too twee. Some of my favorite images are what I think of as his fairy tale photographs. Glimpsed through heavy foliage, a white horse might be a mythical creature; a concrete sidewalk makes a gnarly tree seem like a relic from some forgotten civilization.





He has a keen eye for subjects that seem somehow incongruous with their own contexts. It’s a really interesting take on magic, like he’s collecting forensic evidence of the unseen world.

But what I like most about Kevin’s work is what I like most about Kevin himself: his awesome sense of humor. Just when you decide he must a little cynical re: the whole man v. nature theme:

Cormac McCarthy meets M. Night Shyamalan’s The Happening


he shows he can have a sense of humor about the whole nature reclaiming the earth thing:

Apocalypse with a wink

This last picture, one of my favorites, is charming and depressing at the same time—a worldview that’s pretty spot-on, if you ask me.

shame-loss phenomenon exhibit #294: watching 24

Some years ago, I watched the first four seasons of the television program 24 on DVD within a span of, oh, maybe five weeks. This was back in the days when the show was still totally awesome. At a time when George Bush was president and it felt like the world might end at any second, what could be more entertaining than gory torture scenes punctuated with the dulcet tones of President David Palmer?

Because the show was so intense and exciting (or maybe because it’s unnatural to watch five episodes of anything in a row), whenever it was time to get a snack or hit the loo I would run up and down the length of my hallway in a manner reminiscent of my family’s West Highland Terrier, Emmy (RIP), who had a funny habit of running in circles until she tired herself out. Then I would return to the couch and literally clap in anticipation of the next epi.

Around the time I started watching the show on Fox in real time, it started to suck. My theory is that the show peaked around the time that Tony Almeida started drinking booze from a Cubs mug and things went downhill from there. It’s very difficult for a show to improve once it starts to rot, but the good thing about 24's compressed schedule is that it gives viewers about seven months in between seasons to forget how awful it has become. I guess that’s why I (along with the rest of America) have continued to watch.

But lo! Season Eight started last night and, much to my surprise, it looks like it’s going to be most excellent. There is a Russian crime syndicate (always good); Starbuck(!); Thumbhead Herc from The Wire; Freddie Prinze Jr.(?) (whatever); saucy Brit Sark (yesssss!); and a mysterious menacing redneck who reminds me a lot of my high school boyfriend.

So basically I’ve spent the last two nights pumping my fist like some sort of crazed patriot and yelling “JACK BAUER!” just about every time it goes to commercial. And, let me tell you, when you catch yourself doing this, you know, every 12 minutes, you start to sense you’re approximately one liquor-mug away from total fucking loserdom.

out of sight/mind

Urban living will dispel every romantic notion you’ve ever had about snow. In the city, snow is not beautiful, sparkly, or even white. In New York, for example, snow looks like nothing so much as mounds of wet ash; it turns grey almost as soon as it hits the ground, giving the landscape a vaguely apocalyptic air. It’s even worse in Chicago, where snow serves as a blank canvas for pissing dogs. The day after a serious snowstorm, you’ll see an unhealthy looking yellow patch every two-and-a-half feet or so, and let me tell you—it’s disgusting.

Usually, the snow piddlers favor Pollack-style splashes, though occasionally you’ll see a more controlled pond-type formation. But earlier today, during my afternoon constitutional, I passed a particularly heavy patch that stretched on for about 15 feet. I will spare you the particulars, but it was one of the weirdest and grossest things I have ever seen in my life. For several blocks after that, I tried to imagine what sort of creature could do such a thing. I’ve pretty much decided it was either a dragon or warring packs of dogs that, like, bleed urine.

So basically, here in Chicago snow does nothing so much as highlight the fact that our city is covered in pee. I find this extremely depressing. It’s hard to explain, but when you’re walking around looking at all that animal waste, you start feeling very literal about the whole life is shit thing. It reminds me of the e-mails my mother routinely forwards me with the breaking news in the battle against fecal matter at public eateries. (Like, you would not believe how many times Good Morning America has found that the lemon wedge in your water glass is a glorified turd.) And actually, I feel the same way about all that as I feel about this urine-soaked world of ours—I don’t much mind as long as I don’t have to see it.

I don't like being so negative. Heaven knows I’m full of vinegar, but even a sourpuss like me longs to gaze upon sweet baby 2010 with a modicum of wary optimism (denial?). This seems like an impossible task upon realizing that, within the last 24 hours alone, we learned Sarah Palin is practically a news anchor, Elizabeth Edwards is a bitch, Conan has been demoted, and Blago has brought further shame upon himself and the state of Illinois. It’s enough to get a girl down, so I’ve been baking cookies and buying flowers and reading vampire books in an attempt to keep this big bad world at bay.

And while the bright side is not my forte, I can tell you this much: even when I feel like the elements are holding me hostage here at home, at least the snow looks white from my window.