30x44” Charcoal and matte fluorescent acrylic on rag paper. 2021.

From THE OPPOSITE OF DEATH, the second solo show by Jillian Adel which showed at Stay Fresh gallery in Syracuse, NY from 11/5-11/9/2021.

This is a one-of-a-kind, original artwork and comes with signed certificate of authenticity.
I will contact you to confirm shipping details upon order.

Reads:
born into twilight they made darkness so that we could be light.
twisting towards the sun since birth they used our amniotic fluid for
lipstick, reapplied after eating
steak rare.

is the red on their face makeup or blood? same thing.
incomplete since inception because we are the ones we’ve been waiting for
(they shiver).

the gravity of bodies unvaccinated stacked in refrigerated trucks,
the parents and grandparents in homes, prisons, their last loneliness
we never got to say goodbye.
our hearts broken, again, but they still show up.

outside the spa, their sickness a fever of self preservation, and fallacy, and actually all of the same viruses we are fed
but they have been overcome.

they are dead skin.
we are the sun, our own stars
swirling, gaining mass

“does being a whole world feel like floating?” i asked the moon,
but she doesn’t know anymore than us.

all we have is the trust of the No that seeds in our bellies and makes us hungry for a future that screams and kicks and cries
“i want you to live!!!!”
as desperately as we have since our first lesson on light.

on our birth day, we ejected from darkness, flipped our hearts on by the switch and begged for care.
we have spun since pulsing with the blinding rays of tomorrow,
a prayer for oneness,
and the wreckage of all the times
they made us choose.