Murder Ballads: 2013- gloves and works on paper
Inspired by American folk tunes "murder ballads" is a series of work that weaves lyrics and images together into tales of murder and love. These collages are a mixture of overly sentimental personal ephemera and pulp inspired imagery. The femme fatal, the tough guy, the nymph are overlapped, patterned and intermingled with notes from middle school, photographs and lace saved from a wedding dress.
The lyrics are from a song titled "Down in the Willow Garden"
Down in the willow garden
Where me and my love did meet
As we sat a-courtin'
My love fell off to sleep
I had a bottle of Burgundy wine
My love, she did not know
So I poisoned that dear little girl
On the banks below
I drew a saber through her
It was a bloody knife
I threw her in the river
Which was a dreadful sign
My father often told me
That money would set me free
If I would murder that dear little girl
Whose name was Rose Connelly
My father sits at his cabin door
Wiping his tear-dimmed eyes
For his only son soon shall walk
To yonder scaffold high
My race is run, beneath the sun
The scaffold waits for me
For I did murder that dear little girl
Whose name was Rose Connelly