Innocent

The King, from the series The Dreamer ©Susan Scot Date made: 1996 Materials: oil on canvas Measurements: 50 in. x 62 in./po Other information: The Dreamer, also called Josephine, reworks the Old Testament story of Joseph and the coat of many colours. It turned into a 6 year project with 2 major exhibitions in 1993 and 1996, both in Montreal. I used The Book of J. written by David Rosenberg and Harold Blume, who claimed that the Old Testament was written by a woman, who was a court writer of the time. The stories are cleansed of the Bible’s moralizing, with god no longer a judgmental figure, but a hero of sorts, who sometimes makes good decisions and sometimes bad. I was drawn to this book’s version of the story of Joseph because of the profound emotional turmoil in the sequence of events. The story of Joseph, complete with sibling rivalry, false identity, seperation and reconciliation. Inspired by the writers I changed the gender of the hero from Joseph to Josephine, who I then associated with myself, my daughter, the artist, the dreamer. http://www.ccca.ca/artists/image_timeline.html?languagePref=en&link_id=374&artist=Susan+G.+Scot