The Magician’s Escape

I do not want to be here anymore.

I say it aloud to no one in particular. Not whispered but declared. Urgent. A cry that hopes for an answer. A sign. A voice. Something. Anything.

Leave then. Why. Do not go. Where do you think you are going.

I imagine the responses before they arrive. But they do not arrive. I am drowning and I need someone to rescue me. To guide me. To instruct me. I am ready to be told what to do. I will make their words my truth. I will follow the map they give me. I will believe in the path if someone else draws it.

But there is no map. No voice. No instruction.

Only silence.

This painting is the moment before the escape. The figure presses against the walls of a confined space. Limbs stretched. Muscles tense. The colours shift and shimmer like thoughts in motion. The grid behind them is not just a backdrop. It is a cage. A system. A structure that holds and limits and defines.

I call this piece The Magician’s Escape because it is about the yearning to disappear. To vanish from the expectations and the noise and the weight of being. But it is also about the longing to be found. To be seen. To be told that you are allowed to leave.

There is magic in the moment before flight. In the tension between staying and going. In the silence that answers our loudest questions.

This work is my spell. My plea. My truth.