24” x 36” acrylic on canvas. Canvas on 100% cotton duck with an acrylic titanium triple primer.

What’s the story behind this painting?

As a child of the 90s, my vault of memories from this decade is quite extensive. Yet, these memories all had something in common—they were experienced primarily in front of the television set. Television, for better or worse, served as a reliable and constant companion. Ultimately, TV became a filter of real life events; a substitute for real personal memories that would normally originate from human relationships. By constantly being in front of the TV, I was sometimes exposed to uncensored programs or content deemed inappropriate for children. Then there comes a time in every person’s childhood where they become conscious of human sexuality. Sometimes it’s a shock and other times it’s a series of repetitive moments of exposure, all of which force children to become young adults. Much like the story of Adam and Eve when they bit the fruit from the tree of knowledge, children become aware and ashamed.

            Sometimes there was no way to avoid the exposure, especially if the content came from the evening news. In many instances the tabloid media and the national news bombarded viewers with reports concerning the affairs and sex lives of no-namers and high-profilers alike, like Lorena Bobbitt, Divine Brown, and the most famous of them all, Bill Clinton and Monica Lewinsky. When the news broke out in early 1998, I had many questions about what the “affair” entailed. Night after night, the national news had one story after another about Clinton’s infidelity with other women including his intern, and the sordid details about his trysts with Lewinsky, especially the one concerning a cigar. Of course, the most notable detail was her soiled blue dress. Newscasters couldn’t stop talking about the dress and Clinton’s DNA on the garment. As a child, of course, it seemed mysterious that his DNA had somehow made its way to her dress.

Another puzzling moment occurred when Clinton lied to the public; the President asserted that he “did not have sexual relations with that woman.” While watching this momentous event on TV my mother and I both sat there, uncomfortably, not knowing whether to discuss what the specific details of the President’s admission. My mother’s silence, when faced with an overtly sexual piece of information, sent me a message: anything associated with human sexuality should be swept under the rug and ignored for the sake of politeness. Indeed, this turned out to be one of many things treated as taboo during my childhood.