The abduction of Medusa

I still remember the first time our eyes met. It was late August. We were at the end of the world; at the heart of the desert; in the heat of the summer; at the core of a temporary city erected and disassembled within ten days; at Center Camp. The narrow strips of fabric that covered the cylindrical tent fluttered like ribbons; the sun’s rays penetrated the powdery dust that floated everywhere, creating beams of light. The space was crowded, yet serene. Many people were asleep on the ground or lying on makeshift sofas; others wandered around, read books, people-watched, got a coffee, observed the art works that were dotted around the space. At the centre of the camp, two men engaged in a mesmerising combination of balancing exercises and physical dance; wrestling in slow motion.

I felt calm. I had already realised that I was experiencing something profound, something real; I was open. I walked around the Camp, slowly, observing the space and the people. I turned the corner artificially created by those message boards, and then I saw you. Your gaze stabbed me. It took my breath away. Medusa. Caravaggio. Christos’ last interview. Horror. A trace of Europe in the New World. A sample of Old Art within an ocean of new age aesthetic. A protective bubble amidst the alien desert. Movement. Transformation. Metamorphosis. The familiar ‘before’. The awful ‘now’. The uncertain ‘afterwards’.

I knew I wanted you that very first moment. I started doing laps of Center Camp, walking around, always coming back to you, just to see if the magic spell had been broken. In the days that followed, every time I got to Center Camp, I came over to look at you, to make sure you were still there. By the end of my stay at Black Rock City — for this was the place — you had become one with the memories of the desert and of everything that happened there; of the encounters with Midnight Cowboy, Candy Cane and others. The alkaline dust had started to surround you, to penetrate your pores, as well as mine. I tried to find the name of your creator. On the side of the frame, a cryptic name looking like an Instagram account. I knew that, in that place, there was to be no trading, no commerce; no advertising or promotion. I knew that you were not there to be sold and bought; and that, in all likelihood, you were not up for grabs, or already committed, or beyond my means; not unlike all those bodies that I had coveted all my life.

In the days that followed, the days after the desert, I kept thinking of you. I never feel this kind of desire for material goods, for things; yet, you carried the memory and the dust of the ‘before’ and ‘after’. I knew it was a mistake — I knew I shouldn’t be paying attention to the material expression of that experience, after all I had just arrived at the realisation that nothing actually matters. Even so. I would do whatever I could to possess you. I felt the need to exercise power to make you mine.

I started to look for your creator. It took me a while because she was well hidden in the jungle of the web. What followed was a slow wrestle — not unlike those that we saw at Center Camp; a delicate dance between the creator/mother and the buyer/surrogate. Mother did not want to give up her creation. It took a couple of days for her to trust me. Feeling like I was guided by another self, an outside force, and having an unusual sense of fate — a premonition of vanity — I decided to sacrifice the labour of several months for you. The deal was made in early September. I paid your price in good faith.

Afterwards, I learned your story, the story of Medusa. My suspicions were confirmed. You were carrying a lot of pain. You were the product of trauma; your pores embodied physical and psychological violence; betrayal; injustice — individual and structural, gendered, injustice; ostracism; loneliness; the battle for survival; the all-too-late victory of truth.

As the days passed until you were ready to be shipped, my desire to see you and touch you again did not fade; on the contrary, it became increasingly intrusive. After ten days or so, you were wrapped and placed in a tube. You went off on your journey to Athens, where you would be welcomed by people who could take care of you and give you a home. I could already see you on a specific wall. You were not beautiful; in fact, one’s first reaction may have been aversion; your beauty was flawed, human.

After a two-week journey, on October 1st, you landed in Athens and were placed at the airport’s customs. What followed was a month of surreal, unending bureaucracy, countless phone calls and emails to airport and customs authorities, the post office, the tax office, customs clearance agents; endless forms and certificates, online profiles and trips to police stations for special stamps, another trip to the airport itself, three signatures from different officials on a single piece of paper, negotiating with postal workers at the back entrance of the warehouse, where the trucks load and unload. You see I made the mistake — or this is what everyone said — of trying to do everything legally and by the book. Even so, getting you through customs proved beyond the capacity of the Greek state/family complex. After a whole month, I was forced to “disown” you and to ask for you to be returned to your creator, so as to try again. I knew at that point that the chances of seeing you again were being reduced by the day; after all, the joy of reunion had already been marred by the ordeal of the previous few weeks.

The return to Nevada was even slower and more tortuous than the original shipping. Days and weeks went by. At times, no one knew exactly where you were. At one point you resurfaced at New York’s transit center. At the end of November you finally returned to square one. Reno.

Following days of waiting and preparation and communication with middlemen, the new effort to get you to me started in mid December. This time your destination was New York City. You would be safe there, until we met again. After a few days I received a notification that you had been delivered; you would be in familiar hands soon. Our reunion would take months, but at least you had exited the labyrinth of transit. You were formally mine. The exchange had been completed. You were waiting for me.

Or maybe not.

An email with two photographs arrived in my inbox late on Friday night, 27 December. The tube was missing one of its caps. The tube was empty. You were gone. This is how the tube had apparently been delivered. Someone, somewhere — in Nevada, or in New York, or somewhere along the route — had lost you. And someone else had taken you.

Our reunion wasn’t meant to be. The purity and sanctity of memory would remain unspoiled from the erosion of material existence.

Your loss hit me hard and it hit your creator hard. My only hope is that you will possess your abductor the same way you have haunted and possessed me. For it was you who possessed me, not the other way around.

The truth always finds a way in; a path to victory; although, it usually is too late.

If you have any information about the whereabouts of this painting, please get in touch — email me at rgerodimos at gmail dot com