Mixed media collage on canvas 30w × 48h × 2″ 2022 $1,500
Title after the 2014 instrumental by Weezer, from their album Everything Will Be Alright in the End.
Though the song has no lyrics,
this passage fromBook 22 of Homer's Odysseyis
printed on the album's liner notes:
ὦ κύνες, οὔ μ' ἔτ' ἐφάσκεθ' ὑπότροπον οἴκαδ' ἱκέσθαι δήμου ἄπο Τρώων
"You thought I'd never return from the land of Troy..." — Odysseus, at the moment of his homecoming.
About the work
Inspired by an ancient Pompeii fresco — specifically a lyre player from the House of the Vettii — this large vertical canvas layers acrylic, oil, spray paint, graphite, tissue, cheesecloth, found papers, and grocery advertisements into a surface with genuine archaeological depth. The materials create what feels like an excavation rather than a painting: fragments of ancient culture surfacing through layers of contemporary debris.
In the Modern Myth Making installation, Return to Ithaka hangs as the centerpiece of Window 3, flanked on both sides by two floor-to-ceiling racks holding sixteen small portrait collages of Greek and Roman figures — Ozymandias, Helen, Aeneas, Foiled Hector, Alexander. Odysseus surrounded by the ancient world he navigated. The arrangement was not planned in advance. It arrived the way the best installations do — by following the logic of the work itself.
Publication
- NOVUS Literary Arts Journal, Spring 2026
Exhibition
- Modern Myth Making, City of Burien Gallery Program at Merrill Gardens, June 5 – September 24, 2026
To purchase Contact GJ Gillespie at garjog@gmail.com
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| GJ Gillespie Artist |
Artist Statement
My work exists outside of time. Ancient Greek heroes emerge from supermarket circulars and consumer ephemera. Egyptian pharaohs are built from crossword puzzles. Mid-century abstract figures dissolve into Pacific Northwest landscapes layered with colored tissue and found paper.
Working in mixed-media collage from a 1928 Tudor Revival farmhouse on Whidbey Island, I stand on the shoulders of giants — riffing on cultural icons from Greek mythology, Pompeii frescoes, and the mid-century masters who transformed what painting could express: Arshile Gorky, the Northwest Mystics Morris Graves, Mark Tobey, and Kenneth Callahan.
Titles of each piece are drawn from rock and pop music, connecting ancient imagery with modern soundtracks.
While the themes may seem lofty, viewers will sense a playfulness in the work. Pompeii frescoes meet grocery ads. Ancient Greek busts emerge from fast food wrappers. When it comes to making art I follow the philosophy of Thoreau: the world is but a canvas to our imagination.
Biography
GJ Gillespie (b. 1955) lives and works in a 1928 Tudor Revival farmhouse on Whidbey Island, WA. His mixed-media collage practice draws on the Northwest Mystics, mid-century abstract expressionism, Greek and Roman mythology, and song titles from rock and pop music. He has completed six residencies at the UW Whiteley Center, Friday Harbor Labs. In addition to winning 19 awards, his work has appeared in 77 exhibitions and 214 journal publications.
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| GJ Gillespie Studio |
Gillespie Home overlooking Oak Harbor
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