This is a piece from may of 2011, I've been delaying posting it because I have been concerned I won't be able to do its story justice. It is based off of a nude model we had several times at RMCAD, Billy. Billy was an older, heavyset man, who was always very kind to all of the students. On several occasions he and I spent time together after class was over, and he would tell me about his life. He is a painter himself, having completed over 200 (rather stunning if I might add) paintings of trains. He loves trains, he would show me a computer program that he is writing of all of the Colorado Train tracks rendered in great detail. Perfectly formed trains from head to caboose, and every junction and intersection they cross. He lives in a pop-up trailer in the back of a pick up truck, parked at his friends house. There are elements of his past, that he has asked that I keep private, to protect his reputation with the school. I have many stories that I learned from Billy ranging to every subject tangible. But one story has impacted me more than any other.
Billy was working as a paramedic in Philadelphia, after a tragic occupational accident put his painting career on hold. He was responding to the scene of a major car accident. There were several injured, including one young boy. The boy had the side of his body torn open, rendered clean of flesh and exposed. The boy was miraculously still alive but in very bad condition. While being transported to the hospital in the back of an ambulance, the boy fell into cardiac arrest. Billy, seeing no other option, reached his hand in through the side of the boys open chest and began to manually pump the boys heart. He wrapped his fingers around the heart and began to squeeze in rhythmic intervals. He continued to act as the boys life giving organ all the way into the hospital, until he could be stabilized with machinery. Due to Billy's efforts the boy survived.
I find that story so beautiful. The strength of the connection between Billy and that boy, a stranger. Billy rescued that boy from certain death by physically willing his body to go on. For a brief moment they were one, the boy completely dependent on this man for survival. It is an inspirational act of love so intimate, it defies mortality. They may never see each other again, but i'd like to think that both of them, are permanently bonded. I found the story so profound that I had to create a piece inspired by it.
"Billy saves a life."
dip pen and India ink 19x24"
Garrett Scott Ball
