SUICIDE ON OIL
Falling in Love. (2018) Oil and strychnine on canvas (70×45 in.)
This painting is in memory of Peter Hogarth (46) and his wife Magda (19), who decided to end their life together, after realising they couldn’t afford to pay the mechanic’s bill. Their posh lifestyle, made of pedigree poodles, expensive cars and champagne for breakfast was way beyond their means. Their friends mourned, more than anything else, the yellow Ferrari Scaglietti V8 Coupé. Part of the wreck was recovered among the stone boulders but it couldn’t be restored or sold at an auction, being it smeared with the flesh and blood of the victims. Car enthusiasts still visit Hawk Cliff (now renamed Ferrari Cliff) paying homage to the genius of Scaglietti.
Metal Pastoral (2021) Oil and Nux Vomica on canvas (65×42 in.)
The Simca Horizon is an ugly car but, once it’s crumpled like a squashed beer can, it looks way better. The artist captured this moment of serene beauty only two hours after the crash. Jane Peatmorell (34) was inside the car, bleeding copiously but still alive. But Art is a priority and an artist is not a doctor. His attempts to save her life would have been useless anyway. The car, after smashing at full speed against a pine tree, rolled down the hills, catapulting the upper half of the victim’s body against the windscreen. The Horizon (a 1977 model) didn’t include airbags or seatbelts among its optionals. The painting was sold to the Museum of Wreck Art of Philadelphia in 2023. One year later the Peatmorell family sued its director, Bill White, for lack of decency and immoral exploitation of human tragedy. Bill White won the case. The judge, in fact, declared that the role of art is also to portray the unbearable pain of humanity.
Holidays at Lake Willow (2023) Oil, cyanide, algae on canvas (65×42 in.)
The Patterson family’s sought-after holidays ended up here. The 1997 Chrysler Sebring killed Jack Brodha (55), his wife Brenda (48) their four kids, Billy (14), Nina (12), Judith (8), and Tom (5). Their Labrador Retriever Frisky (7) and their Siamese cat Zondha (5) also died in what has been described a spectacular crash. The vehicle hit a cow, flipped into the air like a wild card, smashed against a metal fence and rolled into the pond, upside-down. R&A Investigation found out that Jack suffered from depression, bipolar disorder and schizophrenia. He was convinced to be a veteran of the Afghan war but, in reality, he never moved from Gardena (CA), where he worked as a clerk at Ross, Dress for Less. The painting is a rather peculiar masterpiece: the artist didn’t focus on the horrendous destiny of the Bordha family and their pets, all of them smashed, drowned and inflated beyond recognition. His attention is focusing on the cows, instead. They modestly appear in the background, gathering around the lifeless body of their bovine pal, Buba, who suffered from a kidney failure and several fractures. Cows are notably dumb yet, they seem aware of their’s fellow cow’s destiny, apparently unable to accept its death. This painting gained instant fame among animal lovers and anti-pollution activists, since the 1997 Sebring was still marketed without post-combustion muzzle filters to reduce particulate fine dusts.
Badlands (2024) Oil and Gympie Gympie on board (80×55 in.)
Marian Skondell (27) and Jane Lurkpins (26) stole a Ford F150 pick up truck from a gas station in Webster (SD) and drove it straight into the Waubay Canyon. The twin suicide was their ultimate protest against the Government’s decision for the Water Amendment of 1984, imposing extra taxes on private pools equipped with winter heating systems. Such trivial episode didn’t obtain the desired effect of raising people’s awareness about this rather niche issue. Nevertheless, the artist’s talent was able to blend the superb beauty of Nature with the utter stupidity of human beings in their ephemeral pursuit of lost causes. This masterpiece was sold by the artist to the owner of the Ford F150 for only U$ 50,000 (the painting’s actual value is estimated to be over 1 million dollars) as an act of generosity and comradeship.
Charles Mut is living and working in Saskatchewan, a place he chose because he liked the name. If you plan to suicide using a vehicle, and you want the final event to be portrayed by his brushstroke, please write to brandpowder. No planes, no tractors, please.
