Combat Boots as Portrait

Recently I spoke to six classes of high school students at Zion Benton High School in Zion, IL about what it's like to be an artist. Among the drawings I showed them was this drawing of combat boots that appeared in the George Clooney movie, "The Men Who Stare at Goats."

The movie wasn't very good but it was as big thrill to see my work displayed prominently on the wall between George Clooney and an actor who was portraying an Army general. You would think this image would be a real boost to my career and make me famous- it would, except for one thing- they wouldn't give me screen credit because giving screen credit to all the artists who contributed to the movie would have made the credits go on too long. So, for the moment, I am famous only to people who know me.

Long before the drawing appeared the movie, there were people responding strongly to it.  I did the drawing originally because I loved the shape and the mirror shiny toes of the black combat boots. The first time I showed the work in public, a woman burst into tears before it and told me the boots reminded her of Vietnam.  Her reaction puzzled me. Then I got to thinking about how shoes, unlike clothing, permanently take on the shape of our feet and wear out in ways that depend on how much we weigh and whether we walk on the inner or outer sides of the soles. They show whether we drag our feet or pick them up, whether we shuffle and slide or make great strides. With time they become portraits of them people who wore them.

 Combat boots are among the items mostly commonly left at the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in D.C. by the loved ones of the men whose names are carved in the black granite of that monument. I've wondered how the people who loved those families can bear to part with that proof that those men once lived, laughed and loved. 

I am grateful to these people for showing me that the drawing had much more significance that I could have imagined when I drew it. When I uploaded it on my Flickr page, the stats showed me that it got a 1,000 hits within a few months- really amazing when you consider the millions of images on the Internet