A wonderful plague
EveNSteve (Artist), Maison Kasini Canada (Publisher)
"A short graite post in the woods of the Cape Cod National Seashore marks an entry point, of sorts, to the large-scale artwork, 'A Wonderful Plague' by EveNSteve. The six panel photograph with handwritten texts uses the 19th century outbreak of smallpox to weave a story about the history of disease and pandemics that connects to the current COVID-19 pandemic. ALong the way, the viewer is taken to the illustrations of immortality during the Bubonic Plague, the pock marks on the face of Saint Kateri Tekakwitha, the '4Hs' of AIDS, and the Pilgrims' laying claim to Wampoanoag crops abandoned after disease wiped out their village. The title of the work is a quote from the 1620 Charter of New England by King James I which cites 'a wonderful plague' that cleared the land of inhabitants as a divine justification to claim the land. The text, which evokes these stories, is written on the branches of trees, on the picket fences and yards of village houses, in the sky about Cape Cod Bay and in the water below. These stories are, like viruses in the air, part of what shapes and makes our experience of the world." -title page
Print Book, English, 2020
Maison Kasini Canada, [Montréal, Québec], 2020