Tags
Anya Riis, art, dare you, drawing, illustration, short story
The latest piece from the studio is called Dare You.
Dare You is an entire conversation captured in an instant. She is the glance over a shoulder on a crowded train platform. It is full of people, noisy and dense. The crowds swell and surge, slapping against one another, a dull roar in the ears. There is helplessness, a lost sensation as people from different places and across time gather their feeble belongings and cram onto trains taking them places they know nothing about. There is the smell of wet wool, of panic and humidity trapped in coats. This is a time of owning little, and craving nothing except the safety and peace of a warm clean bed in a house of warm rooms. There are worn hands and tired eyes. This is a place of passing through and never staying.
But imagine for an instant you turn and stare across the tide of people. For a moment you look out over their busyness and their desire to be gone. You can see their bent backs and hear a baby’s cry. You hear the mutter and roar of a thousand voices, of calling out like birds to one another. The bark of officials.
And she looks back at you.
She stares right at you. It is a challenge or an invitation. She dares you to cross the line. In a glance she can tell you to step back out of her private space, she can tell you her loss and her anger. She is a woman to be reckoned with.
But you can’t work out any more than that. She’s glanced at you, and now she’s gone. She’s borne on this tide of people who are sucked out to sea on their trains that are forever departing the platform.
