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 The Company You Keep
My latest series of drawings titled, "The Company
You Keep" references Mutual of Omaha’s Wild Kingdom, the archetypal nature
show I watched every Sunday evening as a kid in which Marlin Perkins sends Jim
Fowler to study animal behavior in particularly dramatic made-for-TV ways. The
show first struck me as an odd advertising mechanism for insurance. I found
many of their slogans simplistic and hilarious, especially in light of the
state of the US healthcare system. By viewing this show as a time
capsule reflecting the mentality of the era in which it was created, the
drawings have evolved to examine: the application of science to
investigate mysteries of the natural world, the use of language to elevate the
importance of a project, having the best intentions but being unable to foresee
unintended consequences, and above all, Man’s classic literary struggle with
Nature.
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