This was the next drawing Didi did, and the first one that communicated a message. Didi's father and grandfather both had problems with alcohol - her father in fact ended up in a clinic some twelve years after this drawing was executed. Didi hated how alcohol changed people's personalities so dramatically - alcholol was largely the cause of some of the more turbulent incidents from her rather troubled childhood. The picture is partly a collage using cut-outs from magazines, and partly using pen and inks and crayons. This is where Didi began to use symbolism - note the "666" on the trident, the trident itself which is meant to be indicative of the presence of the devil "who drives us to drink"; and then to suffer in the flames of emotional turmoil as a result. The hands gripping the bottle are intended to be those of the devil. So the drawing is not about merely tipping alcohol away into a fireplace, it is actually about "stoking the internal fire of emotions", so to speak: the inferno of normally repressed emotions that alcohol can be inclined to unleash. |