the destroyer > art > editor's introduction

ENDLESSTRIANGULARCOLORFIELDSTOFUCKYOU

I don't usually believe in the products of couples––either created separately or together. It's a mistrust that reflects more about me than it probably should, so please don't read into it. Unless, of course, you think you could change my mind. I've got stubborn Scottish blood and more than a few Jewy neuroses, so good luck to you.

There are exceptions to this rule. In this, The Destroyer's inaugural issue––the very first––I wanted to highlight not singularity (such a tired tired narrative of artistic method) but plurality, to show a way of working that is relational and honest. The four artists represented in this issue, two couples in life and love, Sarah Duncan and Casey Wilson, Yuko Fukuzumi and Nicholas Hay, all came out of the same academic milieu––they are young and recent graduates of Texas State University in San Marcos, Texas. More intimately, perhaps, they also share a common color palette. Pinks and greys, mostly. There are disciplinary boundaries, Duncan and Wilson are primarily photographers, while Fukuzumi and Hay are printmaker/painters. Yet all four create small screen-sized images, perfect for you––our first and most recent lover-collaborator.

It perplexes me as to why anyone creative would want to live and love with someone in the exact same field (Isn't there competition? Aren't there jealousies that are never resolved? Does studio practice actually become relationship practice?), but these artists seem to make this situation work and literally thrive off of it. It feeds some deep part of them. Doubtless, they've seen or noticed particular things (habits, concerns, feelings) about their closest confidant, which is why I've asked them to write each other's accompanying texts. What you'll read is colored by common affinities and frustrations, it's the affective turn taken at face value. You love this person, so what will you write about them? I don't know how I'd respond to such a request––probably poorly.

Wilson and Duncan's texts are like love poems spoken aloud to an unknowing audience––while Fukuzumi and Hay's texts are pragmatic and more than a little funny.

If I could convey to you how I feel, how I grasp at your friendly attention, it would look like these eight images. Inviting and challenging––elegiac and stern.

Many happy returns.

––Andy Campbell