Justin Goldwater

Artist Statement

It was in my show at Domy Books called “Snappy Answers to Stupid Questions” in 2008 and was based on a little incidental illustration I found on the outside of one of those magic claw games at the supermarket. I took a photo of it and kept it around my studio. I ended up working it into one of the paintings for the show, and threw together the sculpture just for fun without really intending to show it. A lot of the work in that show was sort of about my mysticism of suburbia, sequences of leisure and laziness with something lurking beneath. The “character” of the manhole cover fit into the world I was visually narrating – I felt at the time that it was a sort of a “reveal” of subconsciousness, or an illustration of the something that lies beneath all the other stories being told. Like a dumb version of Loki or the trickster Coyote, but who just stays underground and peeps like a little suburban internet troll. He’s always there whether you like it or not, creepin’, but he’s not really harmful – to spite his best efforts to make you feel uncomfortable, if he’s spotted he just makes you laugh. He’s a total failure. Anyway, I simplified it into these clumsy basic forms and threw it into the show as a sculpture, just to see what it would look like. It ended up being my favorite thing and I was pretty stoked when Devon liked it enough to take it home 🙂

• issue #23: "Family Tree" (as part of Okay Mountain)