Empty Road (White) 1985

Howard Finster made this drawing, Empty Road (White), using ink on board, and it's bursting with so much, visually and conceptually. The road itself is the spine of the composition, a stark, linear grid slashing through the organic chaos of mountains, clouds, and cryptic texts. The dense, obsessive mark-making creates a vibrating surface, a world teeming with apocalyptic energy and folk-art exuberance. I love the way the text becomes image, pattern, texture. It's a visual language all its own. It reminds me a bit of William Blake. Both artists created these intensely personal cosmologies, blending religious visions with handmade aesthetics, where every stroke and letter feels charged with meaning. Like all good art, Finster’s “Empty Road” isn’t about answers, but about the restless, searching spirit of art itself.